Similar nearby schools
Most similar nearby schools
West High → Edgewood High School Of The Sacred Heart → Horizon High → Metro School → Vel Phillips Memorial High School → Innovative High → St Ambrose Academy → Middleton High →📋 At a glance
- ✅ Dual-enrollment program (college credit while in HS)
- ✅ Gifted & talented program
- 🎓 AP rigor: Bottom 22% of US high schools
- 📝 SAT/ACT participation: Bottom 29% by test-taker volume
- 🎓 4-yr grad rate: 24% (Bottom 4% of US high schools by 4-yr grad rate)
Composed from federal CRDC offerings, EDFacts ACGR, and other public data. Full breakdowns below.
How Capital High compares for families
What families should know about Capital High.
- ▸ LocallyWI students outperform the US average on NAEP 8th-grade math (+8 points).
- ▸ vs Similar SchoolsThe closest comparables nearby: West High, Edgewood High School Of The Sacred Heart, Horizon High and 5 more. See the sidebar to compare side-by-side.
For Parents
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SAT / ACT participation
CRDC federal data · 2020-21Bottom 29% 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?
Bottom 4% of US high schools by 4-yr grad rate
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.
🏛️ Federal Title I context
High-poverty school
Title I Schoolwide eligible
≥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.
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 -12.4%/year, projecting from 2024's 129 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| West High Madison |
Public | 0.6 | 2,222 | +2.2% |
| Edgewood High School Of The Sacred Heart Madison |
Private | 1.1 | 528 | +8.4% |
| Horizon High Madison |
Private | 1.5 | 10 | — |
| Metro School Madison |
Public | 2.8 | 11 | — |
| Vel Phillips Memorial High School Madison |
Public | 3.1 | 2,004 | -3.6% |
| Innovative High Madison |
Public | 3.6 | 138 | +12.2% |
| St Ambrose Academy Madison |
Private | 4.0 | 124 | +26.5% |
| Middleton High Middleton |
Public | 4.1 | 2,303 | +1.4% |