Summary:
In zip code 78579, there is one middle school, Dorothy Thompson Middle, serving grades 6-8 in Progreso, Texas, a small community where 100% of students are economically disadvantaged.
Dorothy Thompson Middle is part of the Progreso Independent School District (Isd) and has 281 students with a low student-teacher ratio of 10.3:1, allowing for more personalized attention. The school shows a striking contrast in academic performance: while 8th-grade math proficiency is very low at 14% (compared to the state average of 47.24%), the school excels in Algebra I, with 88.64% of students proficient—far exceeding the state average of 54.03%. This suggests the school effectively prepares a select group of advanced students for high school math, but most 8th graders struggle with grade-level concepts. Reading scores are below state averages across all grades, with 6th-grade reading at 36.84% versus the state's 53.52%. The school's overall state ranking is in the 29th percentile (1 star) for the 2025-2026 school year, a drop from the 42nd percentile the previous year.
Despite high economic need, the school maintains a very low dropout rate of 0.5%, better than the district average of 1.7%, indicating strong student retention. Spending per student is $11,866, slightly above the Texas average, yet this investment has not translated into above-average performance in most core subjects. A bright spot was 7th-grade math in 2024-2025, where proficiency reached 47.25%, outperforming the state average of 31.12%. This volatility—from strong 7th-grade math to weak 8th-grade math—raises questions about how resources are allocated, particularly whether they focus on the advanced Algebra I track at the expense of the general student population.
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