26 public K-12 schools in Highlands Ranch 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, Highlands Ranch has more public-school enrollment than 92% of the 4,487 US cities in this directory. Highlands Ranch's average Resource Investment Index ranks above most listed cities even though its student-teacher ratio is on the more crowded side of the national city distribution. That is a useful mismatch, not a contradiction: counselor access, gifted programs, and attendance can lift the composite while classroom staffing remains comparatively tight. Families should inspect the component scores on each school profile instead of reading the city index as a shorthand for small classes.
18 of Highlands Ranch's 26 listed schools use NCES's combined or “other” grade-level classification. Citywide averages therefore blend campuses serving unusually broad or nonstandard grade spans with conventional elementary, middle, and high schools. Grade configuration is a first-order comparison here, not a minor label.
Free-lunch eligibility is reported for schools covering 52.4% of Highlands Ranch's listed enrollment. Because the remaining enrollment is outside that calculation, the measured percentage should not be generalized to every local student. The Resource Investment Index uses other reported federal fields and has its own coverage limits. Treat the city figures as a map of available records: inspect a campus's source fields before using economic need or resource position in a comparison.
Highlands Ranch school enrollment ranges from 306 students (lowest) to 2,325 students (highest), a spread of 2,019 students. That relatively narrow ratio reflects an unusually homogeneous school portfolio for a city this size. 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
Highlands Ranch's listed schools share one district boundary, budget authority, and reporting chain. That makes citywide and districtwide governance easier to compare, but it does not make individual campuses uniform: grade configuration, staffing, programs, and student need can still vary materially within the same school district.
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 Variation between sub-units within Highlands Ranch is typically wider than the Highlands Ranch-aggregate figure suggests.
15% of the city's listed public-school campuses are reported as charter schools in NCES CCD. Charter status identifies a different governance arrangement; it does not establish admissions availability, academic quality, or the share of city students enrolled in those campuses. Open each school record to compare enrollment and staffing directly.
Source: NCES Common Core of Data
| # | School | Score |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | Cresthill Middle School | 60 |
| 2. | Highlands Ranch High School | 57 |
| 3. | Mountain Ridge Middle School | 54 |
| 4. | Mountain Vista High School | 50 |
| 5. | Sand Creek Elementary School | 50 |
| 6. | Copper Mesa Elementary School | 50 |
| 7. | Thunderridge High School | 49 |
| 8. | Summit View Elementary School | 49 |
| 9. | Ranch View Middle School | 48 |
| 10. | Trailblazer Elementary School | 48 |
| 11. | Rock Canyon High School | 47 |
| 12. | Eldorado Elementary School | 47 |
| 13. | Stem School Highlands Ranch | 46 |
| 14. | Skyview Academy | 46 |
| 15. | Heritage Elementary School | 46 |
| 16. | Saddle Ranch Elementary School | 46 |
| 17. | Bear Canyon Elementary School | 45 |
| 18. | Redstone Elementary School | 43 |
| 19. | Arrowwood Elementary School | 42 |
| 20. | Stone Mountain Elementary | 41 |
| 21. | Fox Creek Elementary School | 41 |
| 22. | Cougar Run Elementary School | 38 |
| 23. | Northridge Elementary School | 35 |
| 24. | Platte River Charter Academy | 34 |
| 25. | Coyote Creek Elementary School | 31 |
| 26. | Ben Franklin Academy | 28 |
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.
Cresthill Middle School has the highest Resource Investment Index among the Highlands Ranch schools in this federal-data comparison at 60/100. The index summarizes reported staffing, counseling, gifted-program, and attendance inputs; it is not an academic rating.
Highlands Ranch has 26 public schools with a total enrollment of 19,878 students. 4 are charter schools. Average student-teacher ratio: 16.9:1.
Side-by-side: Compare any two schools or districts in Colorado →
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.
