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Merrill High School

MERRILL · MI · Merrill Community Schools · Public

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📋 At a glance

Programs & features
  • ✅ Dual-enrollment program (college credit while in HS)
Academic signals
  • 🎓 AP rigor: Bottom 29% of US high schools
  • 📝 SAT/ACT participation: 53th percentile by test-taker volume
  • 🎓 4-yr grad rate: 84% (Bottom 33% of US high schools by 4-yr grad rate)

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

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How Merrill High School compares for families

What families should know about Merrill High School.

  • LocallyMI sits right at the US average on NAEP 8th-grade math — local school quality will set your kid apart.
  • vs Similar SchoolsThe closest comparables nearby: Hemlock High School, Breckenridge MiddleHigh School, Bullock Creek High School and 5 more. See the sidebar to compare side-by-side.
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SAT / ACT participation

CRDC federal data · 2020-21

53th percentile by test-taker volume

50th 90th
SAT/ACT test-takers
77
11th-12th graders who took 1+ college admissions test
Test-taking intensity
46.7
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?

Bottom 33% of US high schools by 4-yr grad rate

50th 90th
4-year graduation rate
84%
Range: 80–89%
4-year cohort size
48
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)
39.8%
Elevated — a quarter or more of teachers are in years 1-2. Often correlates with school instability.
% chronic teacher absence (≥10 days/yr)
23.1%
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

Title I Schoolwide eligible

≥40% FRPL — qualifies for Title I Schoolwide program

51.5%
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)

40-74% of students qualify for free/reduced lunch. The district can use Title I funds across the whole school under federal Schoolwide Program rules.

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

Share of students absent 15+ days
22.4%
Elevated above the national average (~16%). Worth understanding — chronic absence compounds into dropout risk, transfer-out risk, and revenue loss.
Students absent 15+ days
37
Federal definition: absent (excused or unexcused) for at least 15 of ~180 school days — about 10% of the school year.

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.

Enrollment trend & projection

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

If the recent trend holds…

At its recent rate of -6.5%/year, projecting from 2024's 165 students:

2025
154
2027
135
2029
118

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.

SchoolTypeMilesHS enrollmentTrend
Hemlock High School
HEMLOCK
Public 5.5 341 +2.7%
Breckenridge MiddleHigh School
BRECKENRIDGE
Public 6.9 173 -6.5%
Bullock Creek High School
MIDLAND
Public 11.4 462 -10.8%
St Charles Community MiddleHigh School
SAINT CHARLES
Public 12.0 200 -13.4%
St Louis Correctional Facility
SAINT LOUIS
Public 12.7
Central Michigan Correctional Facility
SAINT LOUIS
Public 12.8
Swan Valley High School
SAGINAW
Public 13.0 504 -5.6%
Community Baptist Christian School
Saginaw
Private 13.0 79 +2.6%

Researching colleges for your kid at Merrill High School?

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