Best Public Schools in Pearsall, TX

The Pearsall Independent School District (ISD) in Pearsall, Texas, serves approximately 2,500 students across four schools—Pearsall High School, Pearsall J H, Pearsall Intermediate, and Ted Flores Elementary—and is ranked 840th out of 951 districts in Texas, placing it in the 12th percentile with a 1-star rating. The district faces significant challenges, with over 80% of students across all schools eligible for free or reduced lunch, indicating a high level of economic disadvantage that is a key factor in overall performance.

Among the schools, Pearsall J H stands out as the most promising, showing strong improvement from the 15th percentile to the 32nd percentile over two years and earning the district’s only 2-star rating. It boasts a standout 71.88% proficiency rate in 8th-grade Mathematics—far exceeding the state average of 47.24%—and a perfect 0.0% dropout rate. In contrast, Pearsall High School excels at keeping students on track, with a 96.1% graduation rate, yet struggles with low academic proficiency, such as 33.14% in English I and 49.65% in Algebra I. Pearsall Intermediate has the lowest scores in the district, particularly in 3rd-grade Math (17.39%) and 5th-grade Science (13.08%), while Ted Flores Elementary serves the youngest students in PK-2.

Key takeaways include a paradox at the high school, where graduation rates are high but test scores are low, suggesting a focus on credit completion over academic mastery. The middle school’s 8th-grade math success is a bright spot, possibly due to a specific teacher or program, but this doesn’t carry over to high school Algebra I. Interestingly, the school with the highest per-student spending (Pearsall Intermediate at $11,882) has the lowest performance, while the lowest-spending school (Pearsall J H at $10,949) shows the most improvement, indicating that how money is used matters more than the amount. Overall, the Pearsall Independent School District (Isd) faces systemic challenges tied to high poverty, but targeted interventions at the middle school level offer a model for potential growth.