NCES CCD 2024-25 9 schools ME

Best-Resourced Schools in South Portland, ME

Compiled from official source data by .

9 public K-12 schools in South Portland 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
2,837
Students
51.3/100
Avg Resource Index
10:1
Avg Student-Teacher Ratio

National city placement

Broad resource and staffing advantage

According to NCES CCD 2024-25, South Portland has more public-school enrollment than 26% of the 4,487 US cities in this directory. South Portland 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.

The school portfolio is elementary-weighted

5 of South Portland'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 1 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

South Portland lists only 9 schools, yet reported enrollment runs from 16 to 928 students, a 58-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 74%
School count
Top 46%
Resource Index average
90th percentile
Teacher staffing
98th percentile

South Portland High School accounts for 32.7% of all South Portland public-school enrollment

That dominant concentration means South Portland-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

South Portland school enrollment varies 58× across entities

South Portland school enrollment ranges from 16 students (lowest) to 928 students (highest), a spread of 912 students. That ratio is among the widest observed and reflects extreme heterogeneity inside a single city, with small specialty programs listed alongside large comprehensive campuses. 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

South Portland student-teacher ratio is 10.0:1 — low (typically associated with smaller schools or per-school staffing investment that often correlates with stronger per-student supports)

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.

Source: NCES Common Core of Data, Public School Universe

# School Score
1. Arthur R. Gould Sch--Lcydc 63
2. Memorial Middle School 59
3. Dyer Elementary School 55
4. Dora L Small Elementary School 54
5. Frank I Brown Elementary School 51
6. Daniel F. Mahoney Middle School 48
7. South Portland High School 47
8. James Otis Kaler Elementary School 47
9. Waldo T Skillin Elementary School 38

Most racially and ethnically mixed schools in South Portland

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 James Otis Kaler Elementary School 68.0/100
  2. 2 Waldo T Skillin Elementary School 66.3/100
  3. 3 South Portland High School 54.4/100
  4. 4 Frank I Brown Elementary School 52.1/100
  5. 5 Dyer Elementary School 40.1/100

What do families ask about schools in South Portland?

Which South Portland school has the highest Resource Investment Index? ▼

Arthur R. Gould Sch--Lcydc has the highest Resource Investment Index among the South Portland schools in this federal-data comparison at 63/100. The index summarizes reported staffing, counseling, gifted-program, and attendance inputs; it is not an academic rating.

How many schools are in South Portland, ME? ▼

South Portland has 9 public schools with a total enrollment of 2,837 students. Average student-teacher ratio: 10:1.

Other Cities in Maine

Portland
15 schools
Bangor
10 schools
Auburn
8 schools
Augusta
8 schools
Lewiston
8 schools
Scarborough
7 schools

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

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.