Pinnacle High School
PHOENIX · AZ · Paradise Valley Unified District (4241) · Public · K-12 combined
📄 Shareable scorecard →Similar nearby schools
Most similar nearby schools
West-MEC - Pinnacle High School → AAEC - Paradise Valley → West-MEC Paradise Valley Community College → West-MEC - North Canyon High School → North Canyon High School → West-MEC - Paradise Valley High School → Paradise Valley High School → Career Success Schools - STEM Academy 7-12 →📋 At a glance
- 📚 21 AP courses offered — Elite
- ✅ Gifted & talented program
- 🔢 8 calculus classes · 56 physics · 48 chemistry
- 🎓 AP rigor: 86th percentile nationally
- 📝 SAT/ACT participation: Top 3.6% by test-taker volume
- 🎓 4-yr grad rate: 99% (Top 0.7% of US high schools by 4-yr grad rate)
Composed from federal CRDC offerings, EDFacts ACGR, and other public data. Full breakdowns below.
How Pinnacle High School compares for families
Standout academic depth by national standards.
- ▸ StatewideAP rigor in the top 14% nationally with 21 AP courses.
- ▸ LocallyAZ 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: West-MEC - Pinnacle High School, AAEC - Paradise Valley, West-MEC Paradise Valley Community College and 5 more. See the sidebar to compare side-by-side.
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🎓 Academic rigor
AP + advanced-course offerings
Elite — exceptional AP + advanced course breadth
86th percentile nationally
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 · 2020-21Top 3.6% 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?
Top 0.7% 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.
👩🏫 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: A low chronic-absence rate is the cleanest school-level signal of strong family connection, classroom culture, and student engagement — all upstream drivers of enrollment stability. 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 -1.7%/year, projecting from 2024's 2,430 students:
≈ 199 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 $11,572 per student in district revenue, the 199 students projected to be lost by 2029 represent ≈ $2,302,828/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.
| School | Type | Miles | HS enrollment | Trend |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| West-MEC - Pinnacle High School PHOENIX |
Public | 0.0 | 5 | — |
| AAEC - Paradise Valley PHOENIX |
Public · charter | 1.8 | 269 | -16.5% |
| West-MEC Paradise Valley Community College PHOENIX |
Public | 1.9 | 1 | — |
| West-MEC - North Canyon High School PHOENIX |
Public | 2.6 | 22 | — |
| North Canyon High School PHOENIX |
Public | 2.7 | 1,560 | -18.7% |
| West-MEC - Paradise Valley High School PHOENIX |
Public | 2.7 | 14 | — |
| Paradise Valley High School PHOENIX |
Public | 2.8 | 1,900 | +1.9% |
| Career Success Schools - STEM Academy 7-12 PHOENIX |
Public · charter | 3.2 | 509 | +2.2% |