Summary:
The Duncanville Independent School District (Isd) contains two high schools serving grades 9-12 in the Dallas-Fort Worth area: Duncanville High School, a large comprehensive campus with 4,399 students, and Mary E Smithey Pace High School, a very small alternative campus with only 76 students.
The two schools present a stark contrast. Duncanville High School is the district's primary high school and significantly outperforms its counterpart in every academic category. It achieves a strong 92.3% graduation rate and a low 2.5% dropout rate, though its state test scores lag behind Texas averages—for example, only 23% of students are proficient in Algebra I compared to the state's 54%. In contrast, Mary E Smithey Pace High School ranks in the 0th percentile statewide, with a 52.2% graduation rate, a 16.9% dropout rate, and near-zero proficiency on most state assessments. This data strongly suggests Pace serves a high-needs population, likely as an alternative school for credit recovery or students who struggled in traditional settings.
Despite spending 56% more per student ($16,341 vs. $10,443) and maintaining much smaller class sizes (6.8:1 student-teacher ratio vs. 18.1:1), Pace's outcomes remain drastically lower—a classic sign of the high cost of serving at-risk students. District-wide, both schools perform well below state averages on all STAAR exams, reflecting systemic challenges. However, Duncanville High School showed encouraging improvement from 2024-2025 to 2025-2026, with Algebra I proficiency jumping from 7.6% to 23% and Biology from 39% to 56%, offering a hopeful sign for the district's main campus.
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