Summary:
The six schools in Houston's 77057 zip code, serving Pre-K through 12th grade within the Houston Independent School District (Isd) and the Southwest Public Schools charter network, present a dramatic range of academic outcomes, from a top-performing alternative school to a struggling traditional high school, all within a high-poverty area where the average free/reduced lunch rate is 74.3%.
The standout school is T H Rogers School, an alternative K-12 school that achieves near-perfect proficiency rates (e.g., 100% in 5th and 7th Grade Reading) and dramatically outperforms district and state averages, despite serving a specialized population. In stark contrast, Wisdom High School is the area's most challenged school, with a 56.4% graduation rate and a 15.8% dropout rate—over four times the district average—along with low academic proficiency. Meanwhile, Pilgrim Academy (PK-8) defies its 97.57% poverty rate by showing strong growth, jumping from the 29th to the 61st state ranking percentile and outperforming district averages in upper-grade reading and math.
The two high schools in the same zip code offer a powerful comparison: Wisdom High School and Southwest Public Schools College &career Prep Academy both serve high-poverty populations (96% and 93% free/reduced lunch, respectively), yet Southwest boasts a 90.5% graduation rate versus Wisdom's 56.4%, and a dropout rate of just 1.6% versus 15.8%. The Southwest Public Schools charter network spends the most per student (up to $15,068 at Southwest Public Schools Lead &global Studies Academy), but its academic proficiency remains below state averages, and the middle school ranks in the bottom 20% of Texas schools. Briargrove Elementary rounds out the area with the lowest spending per student ($8,647) and a more moderate poverty rate.
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