NCES CCD 2024-25 7 schools KY

Best-Resourced Schools in Union, KY

Compiled from official source data by .

7 public K-12 schools in Union from NCES Common Core of Data: enrollment, grade span, demographics, and Civil Rights Data Collection statistics for every active campus.

PlainSchools home → About this data
7
Schools
7,565
Students
48.4/100
Avg Resource Index
16.9:1
Avg Student-Teacher Ratio

National city placement

Compact, single-district system

According to NCES CCD 2024-25, Union has more public-school enrollment than 72% of the 4,487 US cities in this directory. Union's 7 listed schools all sit inside one district, creating a compact governance structure with one budget, board, and reporting chain. That makes citywide comparisons cleaner than in places split across several districts, but it does not make the campuses interchangeable: elementary, middle, and high-school staffing needs differ. The ranked list is best read as variation inside one system rather than competition among separate local authorities.

Combined-grade campuses shape the local portfolio

3 of Union's 7 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.

One district, but meaningful resource variation

Union's schools share one district authority while their average Resource Investment Index ranks at the 82nd percentile among listed cities. Shared governance removes one source of policy variation, but it does not erase campus differences by grade span or enrollment. The 16-point gap between Ballyshannon Middle School and Larry a. Ryle High School measures the remaining local spread. Use the district-level picture for common budget context, then compare the school components to see whether staffing, counseling, gifted-program reporting, or attendance accounts for each campus's position.

City enrollment
Top 28%
School count
Top 65%
Resource Index average
82nd percentile
Teacher staffing
34th percentile

Larry a. Ryle High School accounts for 27.5% of all Union public-school enrollment

That dominant concentration means Union-wide averages can mask substantial variation outside the largest entity. Grade level: High. The share measures enrollment concentration only; it does not establish how districts allocate programs, capital, or staff. Enrollment-weighted aggregates give this entity more weight than any smaller peer, while an unweighted entity average treats every record equally.

Source: NCES Common Core of Data

Union school enrollment varies 3.4× across entities

Union school enrollment ranges from 609 students (lowest) to 2,077 students (highest), a spread of 1,468 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

Union operates one school district — a single-district system

Union'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

Union student-teacher ratio is 16.9:1 — near the typical range (US average ~15.7) — citywide staffing is neither unusually lean nor unusually crowded by this measure

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 Union is typically wider than the Union-aggregate figure suggests.

Source: NCES Common Core of Data, Public School Universe

# School Score
1. Ballyshannon Middle School 56
2. Gray Middle School 53
3. New Haven Elementary School 52
4. Shirley Mann Elementary School 50
5. Longbranch Elementary School 47
6. Randall K. Cooper High School 41
7. Larry a. Ryle High School 40

Most racially and ethnically mixed schools in Union

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.

  1. 1 Larry a. Ryle High School 45.0/100
  2. 2 Longbranch Elementary School 39.2/100
  3. 3 Gray Middle School 33.9/100
  4. 4 Ballyshannon Middle School 33.7/100
  5. 5 Shirley Mann Elementary School 32.1/100

What do families ask about schools in Union?

Which Union school has the highest Resource Investment Index? ▼

Ballyshannon Middle School has the highest Resource Investment Index among the Union schools in this federal-data comparison at 56/100. The index summarizes reported staffing, counseling, gifted-program, and attendance inputs; it is not an academic rating.

How many schools are in Union, KY? ▼

Union has 7 public schools with a total enrollment of 7,565 students. Average student-teacher ratio: 16.9:1.

Other Cities in Kentucky

Louisville
158 schools
Lexington
74 schools
Bowling Green
36 schools
Owensboro
31 schools
Ashland
18 schools
Elizabethtown
17 schools

Side-by-side: Compare any two schools or districts in Kentucky →

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.