Phillips High

Phillips High is a small rural high school in Phillips, Wisconsin, serving 204 students in grades 9–12. It is the only high school in the Phillips School District and the largest of the three comparable high schools in the area, ahead of Chequamegon High (196 students, about 18 miles away) and Prentice High (105 students, about 12 miles away).

The school's strengths show up most clearly in completion. Its 98.1% graduation rate in 2024–25 is the best of the three schools and well above Wisconsin's 92.0%, and its dropout rate has fallen to 0.0%. Phillips also posted real academic highs: in 2024–25 it outperformed the state in all four tested subjects, and in both 2023–24 and 2024–25 it ranked at the 73rd–74th percentile statewide (4 stars each year). It does this on the second-lowest per-student spending of the three schools, at $15,803.

Attendance, however, is the pressing concern. Chronic absenteeism was 42.3% in 2024–25 — roughly 2.4 times Wisconsin's 17.3% and far above Chequamegon (23.4%) and Prentice (26.0%) — and it has stayed high every year since 2020–21. In 2025–26 the school fell to the 33rd percentile (2 stars), trailed the state in all four tested subjects, and now ranks below both neighbors. That year its special education students placed in the 2nd percentile statewide, and a low-income subgroup that once ranked 4 stars dropped to 2 stars. Because the tested cohorts are small, any single year can swing widely, but the attendance pattern is long-standing rather than a one-year blip.