Union City Schools

Union City Schools is a small Tennessee district serving about 1,647 students across three schools — Union City Elementary School (PK–4), Union City Middle School (5–8), and Union City High School (9–12) — with the district rating 4 stars and ranking 24th out of 141 Tennessee districts.

The district’s strongest school is Union City High School, which ranks in the 87th percentile statewide and posts excellent scores in Algebra II (63.6% proficient vs. 37.3% statewide), Biology I (63.2% vs. 49.8%), and English II (73.7% vs. 58.1%). Union City Middle School is the fastest-improving school, rising from the 67th to 78th percentile while outperforming the state in every core subject — especially math (56.4% vs. 43.0%) and science (55.7% vs. 46.9%). On the other hand, Union City Elementary School is an area for concern: its ranking dropped from the 67th to 56th percentile, science proficiency fell below the state average (43.1% vs. 46.9%), and 3rd-grade ELA (40.0%) trails the state (44.9%). The elementary school is the district’s largest, so these declines have a big impact on overall performance.

A striking paradox exists at Union City High School: despite top-tier test scores and an 87th-percentile rank, its graduation rate is just 81.6% vs. 90.5% statewide, and its dropout rate is 11.2% vs. 6.7%. This suggests strong outcomes for college-bound students, but a notable share of students may be disengaging before graduation. Chronic absenteeism is a clear strength across the district — all schools are far below the 18.3% state rate, with the high school lowest at 7.2%. The middle school also showed exceptional Algebra I proficiency (93.3% in 2024–2025), likely reflecting an accelerated pathway that boosts high school advanced-math scores. Overall, Union City has strong middle and high school academics, but focusing on elementary science, early literacy, and high school persistence would help the district improve further.