Willits High School
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Willits Charter → Fort Bragg High School → Upper Lake High School → Middletown High School → Willows High School → Compare all similar →Enrollment trend & projection
If this trend holds (-0.9%/yr, Total enrollment)
At per-pupil funding of $ / student:
| Horizon | Projected Total enrollment | Change | Funding impact / yr |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 yr (2027) | ~406 | -3 | $0 |
| 3 yr (2029) | ~399 | -10 | $0 |
| 5 yr (2031) | ~392 | -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 Mendocino County baseline — the demographic tide is moving every CA HS, so a school's gap vs. county is the actionable signal.
Enrollment growth is beating Mendocino County (+11.2% vs. +0.3%), but 73 of 426 students didn't maintain continuous enrollment. Why are families leaving once enrolled? Chronic absenteeism is also at 42.7% (up +28.2 pts from 2016-17) — engagement and demand are both signaling decline.
73 of 426 students who enrolled at Willits High School this year didn't maintain continuous enrollment (17.1% 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 28.2 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 — Willits 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: 28.8%
Federal: 14.2%
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 Willits 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).
Willits High School — Enrollment & Outcomes Snapshot
Public · Willits · vs. 10 most similar nearby schools
- ▸On UC Reach, Willits High School sits in the middle of its similar-school group (ranked #7 of 10): 6% vs. a peer median of 7%.
- ▸Its UC Reach has risen 2 points since 2018.
- ▸Senior-class enrollment is up 11% (80→89 from 2018 to 2026), outpacing the peer-group median of -13%.
- ▸At its recent rate (-0.9%/yr), enrollment projects to ~399 by 2029 — about 10 fewer students than today.
Enrollment projection
That's about 10 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Willits High School | Public | 409 | 5.9% | +11% |
| Peer-group median | 7.0% | -13% | ||
| Willits Charter | Public | 131 | — | -29% |
| Fort Bragg High School | Public | 548 | 25.8% | -13% |
| Upper Lake High School | Public | 321 | 9.2% | +14% |
| Middletown High School | Public | 417 | 7.0% | -13% |
| Willows High School | Public | 419 | 5.5% | +0% |
| Cloverdale High School | Public | 388 | 6.9% | -21% |
| Clear Lake High School | Public | 331 | 4.1% | -26% |
| Calistoga Junior/Senior High | Public | 345 | 20.3% | +32% |
| Kelseyville High School | Public | 507 | 5.5% | +2% |
| Healdsburg High School | Public | 510 | 40.3% | -20% |
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 | 5 | — | — | — | — | — | 3.50 | — |
| UC Santa Barbara → Selective | 7 | — | — | — | — | — | 3.28 | — |
| UC Davis → | 8 | — | — | — | — | — | 3.46 | — |