North Parkway Middle School

North Parkway Middle School serves 360 students in grades 6–8 in Jackson, Tennessee, as part of the Jackson-Madison County Schools district, which ranks 134th out of 141 Tennessee districts. The school itself ranks 547th out of 594 Tennessee middle schools (8th percentile) with a 0-star rating for 2025–2026. Proficiency rates are dramatically below district and state averages: just 14.5% of students are proficient in math (vs. 43.0% statewide), 12.0% in English language arts (vs. 40.6%), 15.8% in science, and 21.4% in social studies — roughly one-third of state averages in most subjects.

Within the district, North Parkway trails Northeast Middle School and West-Bemis Middle School by significant margins — those schools post math and ELA proficiency rates roughly twice as high. North Parkway is more comparable to Jackson Central Merry Middle School and Jackson Career Technology Magnet Elementary School, though it does outperform both in math and ELA. Against out-of-district schools, the gap is even starker: South Gibson County Middle School, ranked in the 94th percentile, reports 62.2% math proficiency, and Chester County Junior High School reports 44.7% — 30 to 50 percentage points above North Parkway. Strikingly, North Parkway spends $14,959 per student, the highest of any comparison school and roughly $5,000 more per student than South Gibson and Chester County, despite the lower outcomes.

Chronic absenteeism is one of the school's most pressing challenges: 34.3% of students were chronically absent in 2024–2025, nearly double the state rate of 18.3% — though this is a substantial improvement from 52.5% in 2021–22. Academically, the school has shown slow, uneven gains, with social studies proficiency nearly doubling since 2022–23 and math trending upward, but 6th grade ELA (6.3% proficient) and 7th grade math (6.8% proficient) remain critically low. The school also appears to offer little or no advanced math coursework, unlike Northeast Middle School, which reports 92% Algebra I proficiency. Subgroup data shows African American and Hispanic students rank in higher percentiles than the school overall when compared to statewide peers. North Parkway remains in the bottom 10% of Tennessee middle schools, but recent progress in attendance and several subjects suggests some momentum for improvement.