Summary:
ZIP code 84741 has two high schools in the Kane District, serving grades 7–12: Kanab High serves grades 9–12, while Big Water High serves grades 7–12. Together, they enroll 355 students, but the schools differ greatly in size. Kanab enrolls 322 students, or about 91% of the total, while Big Water enrolls only 33. Both are part of the Kane District, which ranks 26th among Utah’s 92 districts.
Kanab High is the clear standout based on the available academic information. It ranked 12th out of 139 Utah schools in 2025–2026, placing it in the 91st percentile and earning five stars. Students performed above statewide proficiency rates in all six reported English, math, and science comparisons. The strongest results were 10th-grade English at 74% proficient and 9th-grade science at 69.2%. Kanab’s chronic absenteeism rate was 22.2%, better than both the district’s 31.2% and the state’s 23.8%. Parents should note, however, that its 2022–2023 graduation rate of 92.4% was slightly below the district rate, while its dropout rate was slightly higher.
Big Water High offers a much smaller-school setting, but the available data do not include test scores, graduation rates, dropout rates, attendance, or school rankings, so its academic performance cannot be fairly compared with Kanab’s. Its reported student-teacher ratio is 33, compared with 20.8 at Kanab. Big Water also had higher historical per-student spending—$36,896 versus Kanab’s $16,270 in 2018–2019—though its very small enrollment likely contributes substantially to that difference. Overall, Kanab provides the stronger documented academic profile, while Big Water’s main distinguishing feature is its small size.
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