Lowell High School
📄 Shareable scorecard →Compare with peers
Most similar nearby schools
Lincoln (abraham) High → Galileo High → Westmoor High School → Balboa High School → Alameda High School → Compare all similar →Enrollment trend & projection
If this trend holds (-0.7%/yr, Total enrollment)
At per-pupil funding of $ / student:
| Horizon | Projected Total enrollment | Change | Funding impact / yr |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 yr (2027) | ~2,572 | -17 | $0 |
| 3 yr (2029) | ~2,538 | -51 | $0 |
| 5 yr (2031) | ~2,504 | -85 | $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 San Francisco County baseline — the demographic tide is moving every CA HS, so a school's gap vs. county is the actionable signal.
Families who enroll at Lowell High School stay (98.0% stability — elite). But enrollment is dropping 3.2× the county rate (school -5.2% vs. county -1.6%). The audit question isn't why students leave — it's why fewer families are choosing to enroll in the first place.
53 of 2,596 students who enrolled at Lowell High School this year didn't maintain continuous enrollment (2.0% 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 11.1 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 — San Francisco 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: 56.0%
Federal: 7.8%
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 San Francisco 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).
+34.8 pp above peer median (35.8%) · Ranked #1 of 9 similar schools
18.5%
35.8%
53.3%
70.6%
Higher than 96% of California high schools (1105 ranked, ≥50 seniors)
Lowell High School's UC Reach of 70.6% clears the statewide top-10% cutoff (53.3%) — meaning roughly 70 top-6 UC admits per 100 seniors, well above what most California schools achieve.
Against similar schools, Lowell High School stands out clearly — the peer-group median is 35.8%.
For context, the elite tier (top 1%) clears 102.7% — a gap of 32 pp from where this school sits.
Overall, Lowell High School's UC Reach is higher than 96% of California high schools (1105 ranked).
| Campus | Entered | Finished in 4 yrs | Finished in 6 yrs |
|---|---|---|---|
| UC Davis | 53 | 91% | 96% |
| UC Berkeley | 45 | 89% | 100% |
| UC Irvine | 39 | 82% | 90% |
Lowell High School — Enrollment & Outcomes Snapshot
Public · San Francisco · vs. 10 most similar nearby schools
- ▸On UC Reach, Lowell High School sits near the top of its similar-school group (ranked #1 of 9): 71% vs. a peer median of 36%.
- ▸Its UC Reach has slipped 20 points since 2018 — worth watching.
- ▸Senior-class enrollment is down 5% (697→661 from 2018 to 2026), trailing the peer-group median of +1%.
- ▸At its recent rate (-0.7%/yr), enrollment projects to ~2538 by 2029 — about 51 fewer students than today.
Enrollment projection
That's about 51 fewer students. At per-student funding of $ per student, that's roughly $0 in annual state funding at risk.
Default = California's LCFF base grant for grades 9–12 ($12,423 per ADA) — adjust to your district's actual per-pupil figure. Projection extrapolates the recent annual rate — not a forecast of intent.
Your school vs. its 10 most similar nearby schools
| School | Type | Size | UC Reach | Enroll. trend |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lowell High School | Public | 2589 | 70.6% | -5% |
| Peer-group median | 35.8% | +1% | ||
| Lincoln (abraham) High | Public | 2069 | — | -1% |
| Galileo High | Public | 1806 | — | -15% |
| Westmoor High School | Public | 1273 | 25.2% | -21% |
| Balboa High School | Public | 1195 | 38.0% | +3% |
| Alameda High School | Public | 1843 | 51.2% | +5% |
| Oakland Technical High School | Public | 1815 | 45.4% | -4% |
| Jefferson High School | Public | 1041 | 13.8% | +9% |
| Burlingame High School | Public | 1627 | 44.7% | +18% |
| South San Francisco Hs | Public | 1224 | 14.5% | -26% |
| Oakland High School | Public | 1624 | 33.5% | +10% |
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 →
Admit rate vs. CA peer average, by campus ⓘ
How does this school's admit rate at each UC compare to other CA schools whose applicant pool averages the same GPA?
| Campus | Applicant GPA (avg) | Actual admit rate | CA peer avg | Δ | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| UC Berkeley | 3.95 | 11.6% | 12.0% | -0.4pp | On target |
| UCLA | 3.97 | 7.2% | 9.1% | -2.0pp | On target |
| UC San Diego | 3.94 | 13.0% | 21.2% | -8.2pp | Under |
| UC Santa Barbara | 3.93 | 26.3% | 29.4% | -3.1pp | On target |
| UC Irvine | 3.93 | 42.8% | 23.7% | +19.1pp | Over |
| UC Davis | 3.90 | 32.3% | 32.3% | 0.0pp | On target |
Where Lowell High School sits vs. all California schools ⓘ
Overall, this school admits its UC applicants in line with what their GPAs predict (22.0% actual vs. 21.2% expected).
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 Berkeley → Elite | 363 | 42 | 29 | 11.6% | 6.5% | 69.0% | 3.95 | 4.19 |
| UCLA → Elite | 335 | 24 | 15 | 7.2% | 3.7% | 62.5% | 3.97 | 4.28 |
| UC San Diego → Selective | 353 | 46 | 13 | 13.0% | 7.2% | 28.3% | 3.94 | 4.24 |
| UC Santa Barbara → Selective | 315 | 83 | 9 | 26.3% | 12.9% | 10.8% | 3.93 | 4.23 |
| UC Irvine → Selective | 327 | 140 | 61 | 42.8% | 21.8% | 43.6% | 3.93 | 4.14 |
| UC Davis → | 365 | 118 | 26 | 32.3% | 18.4% | 22.0% | 3.90 | 4.16 |