Prairie Lakes Education Center
WILLMAR · MN · Willmar Public School District · Public · K-12 combined
📄 Shareable scorecard →Similar nearby schools
Most similar nearby schools
Lake Park School → Lakeview School → SWWC ELC - New London → Greater Minnesota Education Center → SWWC ELC - Cosmos → Litchfield Area Learning Program → DREAM Technical Academy → WCED 18-22 Program →📋 At a glance
- 🎓 AP rigor: Bottom 6% of US high schools
- 🎓 4-yr grad rate: 10% (Bottom 1% of US high schools by 4-yr grad rate)
Composed from federal CRDC offerings, EDFacts ACGR, and other public data. Full breakdowns below.
How Prairie Lakes Education Center compares for families
What families should know about Prairie Lakes Education Center.
- ▸ LocallyMN students outperform the US average on NAEP 8th-grade math (+7 points).
- ▸ vs Similar SchoolsThe closest comparables nearby: Lake Park School, Lakeview School, SWWC ELC - New London and 5 more. See the sidebar to compare side-by-side.
For Parents
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Get an email when Prairie Lakes Education Center's numbers change — new admissions results, enrollment shifts, test scores. A few updates a year, no spam.
SAT / ACT participation
CRDC federal data · 2020-21Source: 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 1% 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.
🏛️ Federal Title I context
Title I Schoolwide eligible
≥40% FRPL — qualifies for Title I Schoolwide program
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.
🏛️ Your state's public flagship
University of Minnesota-Twin Cities
The in-state tuition gap is the flagship's biggest draw — most in-state families pay far less than the out-of-state sticker. Average net price after aid runs about $16,778/yr. Admission odds depend on your student's GPA and test scores, not which high school they attend.
Source: IPEDS admissions, tuition & enrollment + College Scorecard net price. Flagship = the state's primary public research university.
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.
Enrollment trend & projection
Total enrollment + grade 12, NCES Common Core of Data (2021–2024).
If the recent trend holds…
At its recent rate of -14.1%/year, projecting from 2024's 19 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.
Most similar nearby high schools
The schools most like this one — same type, blended on distance and size — and where their enrollment is heading. These are the schools families here weigh against each other.
| School | Type | Miles | HS enrollment | Trend |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lake Park School WILLMAR |
Public | 0.0 | 29 | — |
| Lakeview School WILLMAR |
Public | 2.3 | 9 | — |
| SWWC ELC - New London NEW LONDON |
Public | 10.9 | 13 | — |
| Greater Minnesota Education Center WILLMAR |
Public | 2.3 | — | — |
| SWWC ELC - Cosmos COSMOS |
Public | 20.7 | 17 | — |
| Litchfield Area Learning Program LITCHFIELD |
Public | 24.1 | 14 | — |
| DREAM Technical Academy WILLMAR |
Public · charter | 0.2 | 58 | +7.4% |
| WCED 18-22 Program PAYNESVILLE |
Public | 21.4 | 10 | — |