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Pierce High

Arbuckle · CA · Pierce Joint Unified · Public

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🎓97% 4-yr grad rate

📋 At a glance

Programs & features
  • 📚 7 AP courses offered — Strong
  • ✅ Dual-enrollment program (college credit while in HS)
  • 🔢 1 calculus classes · 4 physics · 1 chemistry
Academic signals
  • 🎓 AP rigor: 64th percentile nationally
  • 📝 SAT/ACT participation: Bottom 39% by test-taker volume
  • 🎓 4-yr grad rate: 97% (90th percentile nationally)

Composed from federal CRDC offerings, EDFacts ACGR, and other public data. Full breakdowns below.

💡

How Pierce High compares for families

Solid mid-tier academic profile.

  • StatewideAP rigor at the 64th percentile nationally with 7 AP courses.
  • LocallyCA trails the US average on NAEP 8th-grade math (−4 points). Stronger local schools matter even more.
  • vs Similar SchoolsThe closest comparables nearby: S. William Abel Academy, Coastal Buttes Academy, Mid Valley High (Continuation) and 5 more. See the sidebar to compare side-by-side.
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🎓 Academic rigor

AP + advanced-course offerings

Strong — solid AP program + advanced courses

64th percentile nationally

50th 90th ↑ this school
Less rigorMore rigorMost rigor
AP courses offered
7
Math ✓
Advanced math classes
5
1 calculus · 4 advanced
Lab science classes
5
4 physics · 1 chemistry
Other rigor signals
✅ Dual-enrollment program

Source: federal Civil Rights Data Collection (CRDC 2020-21). CRDC reports what's offered + enrolled — it doesn't collect AP exam pass rates (College Board owns that data and doesn't release it school-level).

SAT / ACT participation

CRDC federal data · 2020-21

Bottom 39% by test-taker volume

50th 90th
SAT/ACT test-takers
43
11th-12th graders who took 1+ college admissions test
Test-taking intensity
9.3
takers per 100 students in grades 9-12
Compared against
18,426
US high schools reporting SAT/ACT participation

Source: federal Civil Rights Data Collection (CRDC 2020-21). Volume — not score — is what's reported here. A higher count means more students at this school are entering the college admissions pipeline. Note: 2020-21 was COVID-disrupted; some districts (especially those that stayed remote longer) report unusually low or zero takers.

🎓 4-year graduation rate · federal EDFacts

What % of students graduate on time?

90th percentile nationally

50th 90th
4-year graduation rate
97%
Range: 95–100%
4-year cohort size
97
Students in the 9th-grade entry class tracked over 4 years
Compared against
17,988
US high schools reporting 4-year ACGR

Source: federal EDFacts ACGR (Adjusted Cohort Graduation Rate), 2019 vintage via Urban Institute. EDFacts publishes a range (low-high) to preserve privacy on small cohorts; we display the midpoint.

👩‍🏫 Teacher workforce · federal CRDC

Teacher experience & reliability

% inexperienced teachers (1st-2nd yr)
8.3%
Strong: experienced corps. New teachers rotate through but most have ≥3 years in.
% chronic teacher absence (≥10 days/yr)
29.2%
Elevated. Teacher absence directly affects classroom continuity and student outcomes.

Source: federal Civil Rights Data Collection (CRDC 2017-18 — the most recent vintage that publishes per-school teacher quality fields; the 2020-21 sweep had them suppressed). "Inexperienced" = teachers in their first or second year. "Chronic absence" = teachers absent 10+ days/year.

🏛️ Federal Title I context

High-poverty school

Title I Schoolwide eligible

76.0%
FRPL rate — % of students who qualify for the federal Free or Reduced-Price Lunch program. This is the underlying federal income-eligibility signal Title I designations are computed from (ESEA Sec. 1113).
0% (no FRPL) 35% TA · 40% Schoolwide 100% (universal FRPL)

≥75% of students qualify for free/reduced lunch. These schools qualify for the highest tier of federal Title I funding and typically receive extra wraparound services. Academic outcomes vary widely — check the state assessment + grad-rate tiles.

Source: NCES Common Core of Data, free/reduced-price lunch eligibility. The actual Title I designation is a district decision and may differ from eligibility — but the federal eligibility math is what we show here. We don't claim to assert whether the district formally chose to enroll this school in Title I.

Counselor capacity

Student : Counselor
463:1
Around the US median. Counselors are stretched but functional.
Counselor FTE
1.0
Full-time-equivalent school counselors on staff.
Teacher FTE
23
Full-time-equivalent classroom teachers.

Source: U.S. Department of Education, Civil Rights Data Collection 2020-2021. Counselor ratio = the school's most recent total enrollment ÷ counselor FTE. The American School Counselor Association (ASCA) recommends a 250:1 maximum; the US national median across schools with on-staff counselors is roughly 430:1.

Enrollment trend & projection

Grade 12 went from 106 in 2021 to 124 in 2024 — over 3 years.
+17.0%

Total enrollment + grade 12, NCES Common Core of Data (2021–2024).

If the recent trend holds…

At its recent rate of -2.5%/year, projecting from 2024's 463 students:

2025
452
2027
430
2029
409

≈ 54 fewer students by 2029 — a real revenue/relevance risk worth getting ahead of.

An extrapolation of the recent trajectory, not a forecast of the school's plans; ignores one-off shocks.

Revenue at risk

At $17,756 per student in district revenue, the 54 students projected to be lost by 2029 represent ≈ $958,824/year in funding at risk.

District total revenue ÷ enrollment, NCES F-33. Public funding largely follows enrollment, so a shrinking class is a recurring budget hit.

Nearby high schools — the local competition

The closest high schools families here also consider, and where their enrollment is heading.

SchoolTypeMilesHS enrollmentTrend
S. William Abel Academy
Williams
Public 11.3 41
Coastal Buttes Academy
Williams
Public 11.3 12
Mid Valley High (Continuation)
Williams
Public 11.3 19
Williams Junior/Senior High
Williams
Public 11.4 401 +0.8%
Feather River Charter
Meridian
Public · charter 12.3 614 +61.6%
Colusa High
Colusa
Public 13.3 431 +0.2%
Sutter Union High
Sutter
Public 19.4 734 -3.4%
Butte View High
Sutter
Public 19.4 26

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