Summary:
Zip code 53094 contains just one middle school in this data set — Riverside Middle, part of the Watertown Unified School District in Watertown, Wisconsin — serving grades 6–8 with 616 students, a 12.5:1 student-teacher ratio, $17,649 in per-student spending, and 44.48% of students eligible for free or reduced lunch.
Academically, Riverside Middle trails the state in every one of the eight reported 2025–2026 Forward Exam areas. Its unweighted average across those tests is about 44.4%, compared with about 55.5% statewide, widening a gap that was roughly 8.3 points a year earlier to about 11.1 points. The largest shortfalls are in 7th grade ELA (−15.44 points), 8th grade Social Studies (−13.11) and 8th grade Science (−12.66), while the narrowest are in 8th grade Math (−8.22) and 6th grade Math (−8.36). Notably, the school's scores closely mirror district averages — almost all differences are within ±1 percentage point — so the performance pattern appears district-wide rather than unique to this building. The school's rank also slipped to 474 of 643 (26th percentile, 1 star) in 2025–2026, down from the 38th percentile in 2023–2024.
There are genuine bright spots: 8th grade Social Studies rose 8.09 points to 51.52%, the highest reported score, and 6th grade Math gained 4.93 points. But those gains were offset by a steep 11.66-point drop in 7th grade ELA (to 39.89%) and a 6.81-point decline in 8th grade Math; 8th grade Science is the lowest result at 39.20%. Attendance and completion indicators are more favorable: chronic absenteeism of 15.3% is below the state's 17.3% though slightly above the district's 14.4%, and the reported dropout rate is 0.0%. For families, the takeaway is a school whose outcomes track its district and currently sit below state averages, with math as its comparative strength and 7th grade ELA and 8th grade Science as the areas most in need of attention.
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