Hilmar High School
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Most similar nearby schools
Delhi High School → Orestimba High School → Connecting Waters Charter Sch → Livingston High School → Aspire Vanguard College Preparatory Academy → Compare all similar →Enrollment trend & projection
If this trend holds (+0.5%/yr, Total enrollment)
At per-pupil funding of $ / student:
| Horizon | Projected Total enrollment | Change | Funding impact / yr |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 yr (2027) | ~703 | +3 | $0 |
| 3 yr (2029) | ~710 | +10 | $0 |
| 5 yr (2031) | ~717 | +17 | $0 |
Straight-line extrapolation of the recent annual rate — a what-if, not a forecast of intent. Default = California's LCFF base grant for grades 9–12 ($12,423/ADA). Edit the figure to match your school.
Enrollment stability & demand — 2024-25
Two complementary signals: retention (do students stay once enrolled?) and demand (are families choosing the school?). Read against the Merced County baseline — the demographic tide is moving every CA HS, so a school's gap vs. county is the actionable signal.
Hilmar High School outperformed Merced County on enrollment (school +21.1% vs. county +7.6%) AND maintains 93.2% stability. Replicable model — worth documenting what's working.
49 of 723 students who enrolled at Hilmar High School this year didn't maintain continuous enrollment (6.8% non-stability). Mid-year transfers, dropouts, and other exits are all counted.
Stability by student group
Nearest peer high schools
Source: California Department of Education, Stability Rate 2024-25. Benchmarks limited to non-virtual public & charter HS with ≥100 cumulative enrollees so by-design-high-churn continuation schools don't dominate the bottom of the distribution. Cumulative enrollment counts every student on the rolls during the year, so it can exceed peak-day enrollment.
Chronic absenteeism — 2024-25
Share of students missing 10% or more of expected attendance — the leading indicator that often precedes the demand decline shown above. Families disengaging tend to raise absenteeism first, then formally leave. Basis: grades 9–12.
Absenteeism is up 10.1 pp since 2016-17. A rising absenteeism trend often precedes formal departure — worth investigating which subgroups are driving it.
Source: California Department of Education, Chronic Absenteeism 2024-25. Benchmarks limited to non-virtual public & charter HS with ≥100 eligible students. CDE didn't publish a usable 2019-20 file (COVID).
SBAC academic outcomes — grade 11, 2025
Share of grade-11 students meeting or exceeding the California standard on Smarter Balanced ELA and Math. This is the academic-readiness signal that pairs with UC Reach (post-grad outcomes), stability (retention), and absenteeism (engagement). Note: statewide median Math is only ~20% — a school at 20% isn't an outlier; one at 45%+ genuinely is.
Source: California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress (CAASPP) Smarter Balanced research files. Benchmarks limited to non-virtual public & charter HS with ≥30 tested students.
Student composition — 2025-26
HS grades 9–12 racial/ethnic composition and program subgroups, from CDE Census Day Enrollment. Two-year shift shown when ≥1 pt — surfaces how the community served has changed since 2023-24.
Race / ethnicity
Program subgroups
Source: California Department of Education, Census Day Enrollment 2025-26 (HS grades 9–12). Δ shown when shift is ≥1 pt since 2023-24. Categories below 0.5% omitted.
District financial profile — Hilmar Unified (FY2020)
From 4 years of NCES F-33 filings (the federally-mandated district finance survey). Public schools don't have their own books — the district does. These figures show the financial scale, revenue dependence, instruction-vs-overhead mix, and long-term debt that shape what a school can sustain.
Local: 27.9%
Federal: 11.5%
Source: NCES F-33 Annual Survey of School System Finances (Urban Institute Education Data API). Latest year currently published: FY2020. F-33 is a district-level federal filing — it reflects the Hilmar Unified as a whole, not this individual school's books. Revenue mix shows where the district's dollars come from (state aid dominates in CA via LCFF). Instruction share is current expenditure on instruction ÷ total current expenditure (national benchmark ~60%). Long-term debt is end-of-year outstanding (mostly facilities bonds).
Hilmar High School — Enrollment & Outcomes Snapshot
Public · Hilmar · vs. 10 most similar nearby schools
- ▸On UC Reach, Hilmar High School sits in the middle of its similar-school group (ranked #5 of 8): 9% vs. a peer median of 10%.
- ▸Its UC Reach has risen 6 points since 2018.
- ▸Senior-class enrollment is up 21% (147→178 from 2018 to 2026), outpacing the peer-group median of +11%.
- ▸Enrollment has been growing (+0.5%/yr); projects to ~710 by 2029.
Enrollment projection
Your school vs. its 10 most similar nearby schools
| School | Type | Size | UC Reach | Enroll. trend |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hilmar High School | Public | 700 | 9.0% | +21% |
| Peer-group median | 9.8% | +11% | ||
| Delhi High School | Public | 716 | 25.3% | -15% |
| Orestimba High School | Public | 902 | 15.2% | +21% |
| Connecting Waters Charter Sch | Public | 697 | 7.0% | -66% |
| Livingston High School | Public | 1154 | 9.8% | +1% |
| Aspire Vanguard College Preparatory Academy | Public | 654 | — | +191% |
| Hughson High School | Public | 902 | 12.2% | +55% |
| Gustine High School | Public | 518 | 5.5% | -18% |
| Connecting Waters Charter School - Central Valley | Public | 747 | — | +1633% |
| Waterford High School | Public | 578 | 2.4% | +36% |
| Stanislaus Alternative Charter | Public | 565 | — | -69% |
UC Reach = top-6 UC admits ÷ senior class (can exceed 100% when students are admitted to multiple campuses). Enrollment trend = first-to-latest grade-12 change on file. Similar schools matched on proximity, size, type. Methodology →
UC Outcomes Trend — 2018–2025
Class size from CDE grade 12 enrollment. Campus-level data — applicant/admit totals may count a student at multiple campuses more than once.
Campus Breakdown — 2025
| Campus | Applicants | Admits | Enrollees | Admit Rate | UC Reach | Yield | Avg GPA (App) | Avg GPA (Adm) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| UC San Diego → Selective | 9 | — | — | — | — | — | 3.79 | — |
| UC Davis → | 6 | — | — | — | — | — | 3.85 | — |