Poway To Palomar Middle College High
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Most similar nearby schools
Audeo Charter School Iii → Montecito High (continuation) → Sunset High (continuation) → Dimensions Collaborative Schl → Foothills High School → Compare all similar →Enrollment trend & projection
If this trend holds (+37.4%/yr, Total enrollment)
At per-pupil funding of $ / student:
| Horizon | Projected Total enrollment | Change | Funding impact / yr |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 yr (2027) | ~132 | +36 | $0 |
| 3 yr (2029) | ~249 | +153 | $0 |
| 5 yr (2031) | ~470 | +374 | $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 Diego County baseline — the demographic tide is moving every CA HS, so a school's gap vs. county is the actionable signal.
Poway To Palomar Middle College High is recruiting families faster than San Diego County is shrinking (school +31.7% vs. county -12.5%), but 10 students didn't make it to year-end. The recruitment engine works; the mid-year exits are worth understanding.
10 of 94 students who enrolled at Poway To Palomar Middle College High this year didn't maintain continuous enrollment (10.6% 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 11.3 pp since 2022-23. 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 — Poway 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: 54.6%
Federal: 6.0%
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 Poway 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).
Poway To Palomar Middle College High sent 66 applications to the six most selective University of California campuses and 16.7% were admitted, producing a UC Reach of 23.9% — 5.4 percentage points above the California median of 18.5%, higher than 62% of California high schools..
18.5%
53.3%
23.9%
Higher than 62% of California high schools (1105 ranked, ≥50 seniors)
Poway To Palomar Middle College High's UC Reach of 23.9% is above the California median (18.5%). The top 10% of CA schools achieve 53.3% or higher.
For context, the elite tier (top 1%) clears 102.7% — a gap of 79 pp from where this school sits.
Overall, Poway To Palomar Middle College High's UC Reach is higher than 62% of California high schools (1105 ranked).
Poway To Palomar Middle College High — Enrollment & Outcomes Snapshot
Public · vs. 10 most similar nearby schools
- ▸Poway To Palomar Middle College High's most recent UC Reach is 24% (share of seniors admitted to a top-6 UC).
- ▸Senior-class enrollment is up 32% (41→54 from 2024 to 2026), outpacing the peer-group median of -11%.
- ▸Enrollment has been growing (+37.4%/yr); projects to ~249 by 2029.
Enrollment projection
Your school vs. its 10 most similar nearby schools
| School | Type | Size | UC Reach | Enroll. trend |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Poway To Palomar Middle College High | Public | 96 | 23.9% | +32% |
| Peer-group median | — | -11% | ||
| Audeo Charter School Iii | Public | 148 | — | -15% |
| Montecito High (continuation) | Public | 93 | — | -6% |
| Sunset High (continuation) | Public | 82 | — | -27% |
| Dimensions Collaborative Schl | Public | 147 | — | +28% |
| Foothills High School | Public | 61 | — | -31% |
| Merit Academy | Public | 72 | — | +0% |
| Abraxas Continuation High | Public | 221 | — | +95% |
| Idea Center High School | Public | 129 | — | -25% |
| Major General Raymond Murray High | Public | 143 | — | -4% |
| Mountain Valley Academy | Public | 174 | — | -48% |
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 funnel — which kids are getting in at what GPA
Combining the school's applicant pool GPA, admit pool GPA, actual admit rate, and statewide CA admit rates by individual GPA band, we can read which GPA tiers tend to get in — and which don't.
| Campus | 4.00+ GPA | 3.70–3.99 GPA | 3.30–3.69 GPA | < 3.30 GPA |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| UC Irvine | Strong shot | Real shot | Long odds | Filtered out |
The numbers behind it
| Campus | Applicant GPA | Admit GPA | Lift ⓘ | Admit rate | vs peer schools @ same GPA ⓘ |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| UC Irvine | 3.89 | 4.08 | +0.19 | 53.8% | Peers +0.28 · wider |
📊 Statewide CA admit rates by individual GPA band, 2025 (for reference)
| GPA band | UCB | UCLA | UCSD | UCSB | UCI | UCD |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 4.00+ | 17.0% | 15.1% | 45.2% | 62.3% | 46.3% | 65.9% |
| 3.70–3.99 | 3.1% | 1.6% | 9.3% | 17.6% | 17.0% | 31.1% |
| 3.30–3.69 | 0.8% | 0.5% | 1.5% | 2.8% | 2.4% | 10.3% |
| 3.00–3.29 | 0.4% | 0.3% | 0.2% | 0.4% | 0.3% | 1.9% |
| < 3.00 | 0.7% | 0.4% | 0.3% | 0.2% | 0.1% | 0.7% |
UC Outcomes Trend — 2024–2025
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 | 9 | — | — | — | — | — | 3.94 | — |
| UCLA → Elite | 11 | — | — | — | — | — | 3.91 | — |
| UC San Diego → Selective | 13 | — | — | — | — | — | 3.89 | — |
| UC Santa Barbara → Selective | 9 | — | — | — | — | — | 3.91 | — |
| UC Irvine → Selective | 13 | 7 | 3 | 53.8% | 15.2% | 42.9% | 3.89 | 4.08 |
| UC Davis → | 11 | 4 | — | 36.4% | 8.7% | — | 3.85 | — |