Paden City High School
Paden City · WV · Wetzel County Schools · Public · K-12 combined
📋 At a glance
- 📚 1 AP courses offered — Moderate
- ✅ Dual-enrollment program (college credit while in HS)
- ✅ Gifted & talented program
- 🎓 AP rigor: Bottom 37% of US high schools
- 📝 SAT/ACT participation: Bottom 26% by test-taker volume
- 🎓 4-yr grad rate: 95% (75th percentile nationally)
Composed from federal CRDC offerings, EDFacts ACGR, and other public data. Full breakdowns below.
How Paden City High School compares for families
Solid mid-tier academic profile.
- ▸ LocallyWV trails the US average on NAEP 8th-grade math (−9 points). Stronger local schools matter even more.
- ▸ vs Similar SchoolsThe closest comparables nearby: Magnolia High School, Wetzel County Technical Education Center, Tyler Consolidated High School and 5 more. See the sidebar to compare side-by-side.
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🎓 Academic rigor
AP + advanced-course offerings
Moderate — some AP / advanced course access
Bottom 37% of US high schools
✅ Gifted/talented 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 · 2020-21Bottom 26% by test-taker volume
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?
75th percentile nationally
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
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.
Chronic absenteeism
Why this matters to enrollment: Chronic absence is the most reliable early indicator that a student will leave a school — either by transferring out, dropping out, or matriculating to a charter or private alternative. At this level, today's absentees become next year's enrollment loss and the year-after's revenue loss. For school leaders: an Enrollment Trend Audit traces this dynamic forward →
Source: U.S. Department of Education, Civil Rights Data Collection 2020–2021. Rate = students chronically absent ÷ 2024 total enrollment.
Counselor capacity
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
Total enrollment + grade 12, NCES Common Core of Data (2021–2024).
If the recent trend holds…
At its recent rate of -2.7%/year, projecting from 2024's 152 students:
A small or specialty program — naive trend math doesn't capture the school's full picture. Read the trend as directional, not predictive.
An extrapolation of the recent trajectory, not a forecast of the school's plans; ignores one-off shocks.
Nearby high schools — the local competition
The closest high schools families here also consider, and where their enrollment is heading.
| School | Type | Miles | HS enrollment | Trend |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Magnolia High School New Martinsville |
Public | 4.7 | 275 | -24.0% |
| Wetzel County Technical Education Center New Martinsville |
Public | 4.8 | — | — |
| Tyler Consolidated High School Sistersville |
Public | 6.2 | 368 | +0.3% |
| Valley High School Pine Grove |
Public | 13.9 | 124 | -18.4% |
| St. Marys High School Saint Marys |
Public | 18.2 | 309 | -3.4% |
| Mid Ohio Valley Technical Institute Saint Marys |
Public | 18.3 | 3 | — |
| Doddridge County High School West Union |
Public | 24.0 | 355 | +10.6% |
| Gateway Achievement Center Moundsville |
Public | 24.7 | 34 | — |