Summary:
Marion, Wisconsin has two public schools serving about 482 students in the Marion School District: Marion Elementary, which covers grades PK–6 with 255 students, and Marion High, which covers grades 7–12 with 227 students. There is no separate middle school, so grades 7 and 8 sit inside the high school while grade 6 remains at the elementary. The district itself is ranked 334 of 432 in Wisconsin, in the 23rd percentile with 1 star — a figure that sits below both of its individual schools.
Marion High is the clearest improvement story. It rose from the 14th percentile with 1 star in 2023–2024 to the 52nd percentile with 3 stars in 2025–2026. Its graduation rate of 97.1% beats the state's 92.0%, and its dropout rate of 0.9% is below the state's 1.1%. Grade 10 ACT ELA (53.33% proficient) and ACT Math (43.33%) are also above state. However, Forward Exam ELA and math in grades 7–8 are mostly below state averages, so the gains appear driven more by completion and college-readiness measures than by broad grade-level proficiency. Chronic absenteeism is 18.1%, slightly above the state's 17.3%.
Marion Elementary is steadier, holding in the mid-30s to 40th percentile with 2 stars, but it is uneven. Its standout is 5th grade math at 79.17% proficient versus 51.81% statewide, the highest figure in the data and 27.36 points above state; 5th grade ELA and 6th grade math also exceed state. Yet 3rd grade ELA and math both sit at 34.29%, well below state, with 3rd grade math down 30.57 points year over year and 4th grade ELA down 17.26 points. Spending, student-teacher ratios, and free/reduced lunch rates are similar across both schools, so the differing results look tied to grade-level and cohort effects rather than resource gaps.
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