Needles High School
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Most similar nearby schools
High Desert Premier Academy → Desert Learning Academy → Valley Academy → Mt San Jacinto High School → La Familia Continuation High → Compare all similar →Enrollment trend & projection
If this trend holds (+1.0%/yr, Total enrollment)
At per-pupil funding of $ / student:
| Horizon | Projected Total enrollment | Change | Funding impact / yr |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 yr (2027) | ~259 | +2 | $0 |
| 3 yr (2029) | ~265 | +8 | $0 |
| 5 yr (2031) | ~270 | +13 | $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 Bernardino County baseline — the demographic tide is moving every CA HS, so a school's gap vs. county is the actionable signal.
Needles High School outperformed San Bernardino County on enrollment (school +11.3% vs. county +0.0%) AND maintains 83.4% stability. Replicable model — worth documenting what's working. Chronic absenteeism is rising (26.4%, +8.4 pts since 2016-17) — a watch signal worth monitoring as a leading indicator.
49 of 296 students who enrolled at Needles High School this year didn't maintain continuous enrollment (16.6% 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 8.4 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 — Needles 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: 22.7%
Federal: 21.1%
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 Needles 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).
Needles High School — Enrollment & Outcomes Snapshot
Public · Needles · vs. 10 most similar nearby schools
- ▸Senior-class enrollment is up 11% (53→59 from 2018 to 2026), trailing the peer-group median of +28%.
- ▸Enrollment has been growing (+1.0%/yr); projects to ~265 by 2029.
Enrollment projection
Your school vs. its 10 most similar nearby schools
| School | Type | Size | UC Reach | Enroll. trend |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Needles High School | Public | 257 | — | +11% |
| Peer-group median | 15.9% | +28% | ||
| High Desert Premier Academy | Public | 273 | — | +240% |
| Desert Learning Academy | Public | 228 | — | -6% |
| Valley Academy | Public | 216 | — | +61% |
| Mt San Jacinto High School | Public | 310 | — | -17% |
| La Familia Continuation High | Public | 208 | — | +53% |
| Nova Academy-Coachella | Public | 205 | 23.7% | -21% |
| Lucerne Valley High School | Public | 323 | — | +77% |
| Amistad High (continuation) | Public | 200 | — | +12% |
| Calipatria High School | Public | 340 | 8.1% | -10% |
| San Pasqual Valley High School | Public | 180 | — | +43% |
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 →
GPA figures reflect 2022 — UC has not yet released applicant/admit GPA for 2024.
Campus Breakdown — 2024
| Campus | Applicants | Admits | Enrollees | Admit Rate | UC Reach | Yield | Avg GPA (App) '22 | Avg GPA (Adm) '22 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| UC Berkeley → Elite | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| UCLA → Elite | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| UC San Diego → Selective | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| UC Santa Barbara → Selective | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| UC Irvine → Selective | — | — | — | — | — | — | 4.19 | — |
| UC Davis → | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |