NCES CCD 2024-25 9 schools LA

Best-Resourced Schools in Ruston, LA

Compiled from official source data by .

9 public K-12 schools in Ruston 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
9
Schools
4,053
Students
45.8/100
Avg Resource Index
23.8:1
Avg Student-Teacher Ratio

National city placement

Resource breadth with tighter class loads

According to NCES CCD 2024-25, Ruston has more public-school enrollment than 45% of the 4,487 US cities in this directory. Ruston'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.

The school portfolio is elementary-weighted

5 of Ruston's 9 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 1 high-school records. Families comparing later grades should rely on those individual rows rather than the all-school mean.

A small portfolio contains radically different campus scales

Ruston lists only 9 schools, yet reported enrollment runs from 75 to 1,212 students, a 16-fold range. In a portfolio this compact, the smallest record may be a specialized or nonstandard setting rather than a miniature version of the largest campus. That distinction affects how ratios and program fields should be read. Compare similarly configured grade levels first; combining the extremes into one city average conceals more than it explains.

City enrollment
Top 55%
School count
Top 46%
Resource Index average
73rd percentile
Teacher staffing
4th percentile

Ruston High School accounts for 29.9% of all Ruston public-school enrollment

That dominant concentration means Ruston-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

Ruston school enrollment varies 16× across entities

Ruston school enrollment ranges from 75 students (lowest) to 1,212 students (highest), a spread of 1,137 students. That spread reflects typical urban portfolio variation between specialty programs and large neighbourhood schools. 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

Ruston reports 55.2% free-lunch eligibility

The reported share clears the 50% majority mark. Title I operates under the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA, 2015), but its statutory allocation uses additional LEA-level counts and rules not represented by this average. This percentage is an economic-need context measure; it does not establish a Title I award, show dollars received, or describe how funds are distributed among campuses.

Source: NCES Common Core of Data

Ruston student-teacher ratio is 23.8:1 — high (typically associated with larger urban scale or staffing constraints that have widened the headcount gap)

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.

Source: NCES Common Core of Data, Public School Universe

# School Score
1. Cypress Springs Elementary School 60
2. I.a. Lewis School 60
3. Ruston High School 56
4. Ruston Junior High School 54
5. Ruston Elementary School 53
6. Glen View Elementary School 49
7. Hillcrest Elementary School 43
8. Howard School 34
9. A. E. Phillips Laboratory School 3

Most racially and ethnically mixed schools in Ruston

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 Hillcrest Elementary School 68.5/100
  2. 2 Ruston Elementary School 62.7/100
  3. 3 Ruston High School 60.3/100
  4. 4 Ruston Junior High School 59.5/100
  5. 5 I.a. Lewis School 56.1/100

What do families ask about schools in Ruston?

Which Ruston school has the highest Resource Investment Index? ▼

Cypress Springs Elementary School has the highest Resource Investment Index among the Ruston 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.

How many schools are in Ruston, LA? ▼

Ruston has 9 public schools with a total enrollment of 4,053 students. Average student-teacher ratio: 23.8:1.

Other Cities in Louisiana

Baton Rouge
101 schools
New Orleans
79 schools
Shreveport
54 schools
Lake Charles
36 schools
Monroe
34 schools
Lafayette
30 schools

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

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.