17 public K-12 schools in Crystal Lake 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, Crystal Lake has more public-school enrollment than 84% of the 4,487 US cities in this directory. Crystal Lake lands in the upper national tier on both the average Resource Investment Index and teacher staffing intensity. Those measures come from different inputs: the index combines reported counselors, gifted access, attendance, and staffing, while the staffing percentile compares the city's student-teacher ratio directly. Agreement across both measures is stronger evidence of broad reported capacity than either score alone, though neither is a test-score rating or a guarantee about an individual classroom.
9 of Crystal Lake's 17 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 3 middle and 3 high-school records. Families comparing later grades should rely on those individual rows rather than the all-school mean.
The 30-point gap between Glacier Ridge Elementary School and Crystal Lake Central High School shows the range hidden by Crystal Lake'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.
Crystal Lake school enrollment ranges from 357 students (lowest) to 1,443 students (highest), a spread of 1,086 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
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 Lower values often correlate with smaller scale and population characteristics rather than higher resource budgets per se.
| # | School | Score |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | Glacier Ridge Elementary School | 64 |
| 2. | South Elem School | 61 |
| 3. | Woods Creek Elementary School | 59 |
| 4. | West Elem School | 56 |
| 5. | Husmann Elem School | 56 |
| 6. | Indian Prairie Elem School | 56 |
| 7. | Canterbury Elem School | 54 |
| 8. | Lundahl Middle School | 52 |
| 9. | Richard F Bernotas Middle Sch | 52 |
| 10. | North Elem School | 52 |
| 11. | Coventry Elem School | 50 |
| 12. | Prairie Grove Junior High School | 48 |
| 13. | Prairie Ridge High School | 42 |
| 14. | Prairie Grove Elem School | 40 |
| 15. | Crystal Lake South High School | 39 |
| 16. | Hannah Beardsley Middle School | 39 |
| 17. | Crystal Lake Central High School | 34 |
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.
Glacier Ridge Elementary School has the highest Resource Investment Index among the Crystal Lake 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.
Crystal Lake has 17 public schools with a total enrollment of 11,653 students. Average student-teacher ratio: 13.4:1.
Side-by-side: Compare any two schools or districts in Illinois →
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.
