Taft Union High School
📄 Shareable scorecard →Compare with peers
Most similar nearby schools
Shafter High School → Delano High School → Mcfarland High School Early College → Independence High → Stockdale High School → Compare all similar →Enrollment trend & projection
If this trend holds (+1.8%/yr, Total enrollment)
At per-pupil funding of $ / student:
| Horizon | Projected Total enrollment | Change | Funding impact / yr |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 yr (2027) | ~1,120 | +20 | $0 |
| 3 yr (2029) | ~1,160 | +60 | $0 |
| 5 yr (2031) | ~1,202 | +102 | $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 Kern County baseline — the demographic tide is moving every CA HS, so a school's gap vs. county is the actionable signal.
Enrollment and retention both close to Kern County baseline. The demographic tide is the main mover; no internal break in the system, but no outperformance either. Chronic absenteeism is rising (21.1%, +10.1 pts since 2016-17) — a watch signal worth monitoring as a leading indicator.
163 of 1,145 students who enrolled at Taft Union High School this year didn't maintain continuous enrollment (14.2% 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 — Taft Union High (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: 47.6%
Federal: 7.4%
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 Taft Union High 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).
-5.5 pp vs. peer median (10.8%) · Ranked #9 of 9 similar schools
18.5%
10.8%
53.3%
5.3%
Higher than 5% of California high schools (1105 ranked, ≥50 seniors)
Taft Union High School's UC Reach of 5.3% is below the California median (18.5%). The top 10% of CA schools achieve 53.3% or higher.
Overall, Taft Union High School's UC Reach is higher than 5% of California high schools (1105 ranked).
Taft Union High School — Enrollment & Outcomes Snapshot
Public · Taft · vs. 10 most similar nearby schools
- ▸On UC Reach, Taft Union High School sits near the bottom of its similar-school group (ranked #9 of 9): 5% vs. a peer median of 11%.
- ▸Its UC Reach has risen 2 points since 2019.
- ▸Senior-class enrollment is up 12% (223→249 from 2018 to 2026), outpacing the peer-group median of +6%.
- ▸Enrollment has been growing (+1.8%/yr); projects to ~1160 by 2029.
Enrollment projection
Your school vs. its 10 most similar nearby schools
| School | Type | Size | UC Reach | Enroll. trend |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Taft Union High School | Public | 1100 | 5.3% | +12% |
| Peer-group median | 10.8% | +6% | ||
| Shafter High School | Public | 1670 | 6.7% | +24% |
| Delano High School | Public | 1183 | 11.1% | -12% |
| Mcfarland High School Early College | Public | 1017 | — | +29% |
| Independence High | Public | 2415 | 7.8% | +18% |
| Stockdale High School | Public | 2366 | 25.3% | +8% |
| Frontier High School | Public | 2098 | 8.5% | -12% |
| Tehachapi High School | Public | 1249 | 10.9% | -14% |
| Wasco High | Public | 1656 | — | +3% |
| Cesar E Chavez High School | Public | 1284 | 12.3% | -14% |
| Liberty High School | Public | 2413 | 10.6% | +26% |
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 Santa Barbara | 3.74 | 66.7% | 26.5% | +40.2pp | Over |
| UC Irvine | 3.86 | 42.9% | 21.7% | +21.2pp | Over |
| UC Davis | 3.73 | 62.5% | 32.1% | +30.4pp | Over |
UC Outcomes Trend — 2019–2025
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 | 5 | — | — | — | — | — | 4.02 | — |
| UCLA → Elite | 12 | — | — | — | — | — | 3.76 | — |
| UC San Diego → Selective | 6 | — | — | — | — | — | 3.79 | — |
| UC Santa Barbara → Selective | 9 | 6 | — | 66.7% | 2.3% | — | 3.74 | 3.98 |
| UC Irvine → Selective | 7 | 3 | — | 42.9% | 1.1% | — | 3.86 | — |
| UC Davis → | 8 | 5 | — | 62.5% | 1.9% | — | 3.73 | 4.09 |