22 public K-12 schools in San Mateo from NCES Common Core of Data: enrollment, grade span, demographics, and Civil Rights Data Collection statistics for every active campus.
National city placement
According to NCES CCD 2024-25, San Mateo has more public-school enrollment than 85% of the 4,487 US cities in this directory. San Mateo sits in the broad middle of the national city distribution rather than at a single obvious extreme. Its scale, average Resource Investment Index, and staffing position need to be read together: a middle placement on one measure does not cancel a stronger or weaker result on another. The percentile panel makes those dimensions explicit, and the school table shows where the city aggregate breaks into materially different campus profiles.
14 of San Mateo's 22 listed schools are elementary campuses. That composition means citywide enrollment and staffing averages are influenced more by early-grade operating patterns than by the city's 2 middle and 3 high-school records. Families comparing later grades should rely on those individual rows rather than the all-school mean.
The 49-point gap between Gateway Center and Laurel Elementary shows the range hidden by San Mateo's average Resource Investment Index. The city figure is useful for national placement, but families ultimately choose among campuses with different grade spans, enrollment, district affiliations, and reported support fields. Start with schools serving the relevant grade level, then compare the index components rather than assuming the city average describes any one classroom.
San Mateo school enrollment ranges from 7 students (lowest) to 1,658 students (highest), a spread of 1,651 students. That ratio is an extreme outlier spread — among the widest gaps observed anywhere in this dataset. Per-school staffing and program breadth can differ sharply at opposite ends of that enrollment range, so the city average should not be treated as a typical campus.
Source: NCES Common Core of Data
student-teacher ratio is the simplest comparative metric but it does not capture the full picture: the ratio counts FTE classroom teachers against total enrollment, push-in specialists, English-language aides, special-education co-teachers, and counselors are not included in most reporting Higher values may reflect larger urban scale or recent resource constraints that have widened the gap.
| # | School | Score |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | Gateway Center | 64 |
| 2. | Hillcrest at Youth Services Center | 63 |
| 3. | Borel Middle | 47 |
| 4. | Margaret J. Kemp | 47 |
| 5. | Bayside Academy | 43 |
| 6. | Fiesta Gardens International Elementary | 43 |
| 7. | College Park Elementary | 41 |
| 8. | Highlands Elementary | 41 |
| 9. | Hillsdale High | 38 |
| 10. | North Shoreview Montessori | 38 |
| 11. | George Hall Elementary | 37 |
| 12. | Baywood Elementary | 36 |
| 13. | Parkside Montessori | 36 |
| 14. | Meadow Heights Elementary | 34 |
| 15. | Aragon High | 33 |
| 16. | Abbott Middle | 33 |
| 17. | Beresford Elementary | 32 |
| 18. | San Mateo High | 30 |
| 19. | Sunnybrae Elementary | 22 |
| 20. | San Mateo Park Elementary | 21 |
| 21. | Lead Elementary | 20 |
| 22. | Laurel Elementary | 15 |
Ranked by the Simpson student-body diversity index (0-100) from NCES race and ethnicity data, where higher means a more evenly mixed student body. It measures mix, not quality.
Gateway Center has the highest Resource Investment Index among the San Mateo schools in this federal-data comparison at 64/100. The index summarizes reported staffing, counseling, gifted-program, and attendance inputs; it is not an academic rating.
San Mateo has 22 public schools with a total enrollment of 12,088 students. Average student-teacher ratio: 18.4:1.
Side-by-side: Compare any two schools or districts in California →
Data from NCES Common Core of Data (CCD) 2024-25 and Civil Rights Data Collection (CRDC) 2021-22. The Resource Investment Index uses reported student-teacher ratio, counselor access, gifted programs, and attendance; it is not an academic rating. Cities must include at least five schools to be listed. This public-data comparison is for informational purposes: verify current enrollment, attendance boundaries, and programs with the school district before acting. See the guide to understanding NCES data.
