Summary:
The Waukesha School District area is home to 8 high schools enrolling about 3,916 students, and it offers a wider mix of options than most districts. Alongside three comprehensive high schools — West High, North High, and South High — families can choose an online academy serving grades 6–12, two small career academies, an alternative school, and a grade-12-only transition program. Waukesha School District is ranked #184 of 432 in Wisconsin, at the 57th percentile with 3 stars.
Waukesha Engineering Preparatory Academy is the district's star: #4 of 533 statewide, 99th percentile, 5 stars, with 100.0% graduation, 0.0% dropout, 0.0% chronic absenteeism, and Math proficiency of 89.19%. Among traditional high schools, West High is strongest — the largest at 1,167 students, 86th percentile, 4 stars, 96.4% graduation, and above district and state averages in all four reported 10th-grade subjects. North High is the most improved, climbing from 1 star and 24th percentile to 3 stars and 56th percentile with gains in every subject. Waukesha Academy of Health Professions graduates 100.0% of students but slipped to the 61st percentile.
South High is the clearest comprehensive-school challenge, sitting in the bottom quartile for three straight years, below district and state in every reported subject, with 30.8% chronic absenteeism — even though it has a lower student-teacher ratio and higher per-student spending than its peers. Waukesha East Alternative School shows the most acute signals: 6th percentile and 0 stars, 81.6% chronic absenteeism, and 78.38% free/reduced lunch. eAchieve Academy has the lowest reported graduation rate at 82.4% and the highest dropout rate at 3.0%. Note that small programs produce extreme figures — reported student-teacher ratios of 112 and 48, or $26,845 per-student spending at a 36-student program such as Waukesha Transition Academy — that are not comparable to comprehensive high schools. Chronic absenteeism is the key indicator: low at the top performers, extremely high at East Alternative.
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