NCES CCD 2024-25 7 schools MI

Best-Resourced Schools in Carleton, MI

Compiled from official source data by .

7 public K-12 schools in Carleton 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
2,345
Students
37/100
Avg Resource Index
20.1:1
Avg Student-Teacher Ratio

National city placement

Compact, single-district system

According to NCES CCD 2024-25, Carleton has more public-school enrollment than 18% of the 4,487 US cities in this directory. Carleton'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 Carleton'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.

A small portfolio contains radically different campus scales

Carleton lists only 7 schools, yet reported enrollment runs from 12 to 760 students, a 63-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 82%
School count
Top 65%
Resource Index average
33rd percentile
Teacher staffing
15th percentile

Airport Senior High School accounts for 32.4% of all Carleton public-school enrollment

That dominant concentration means Carleton-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

Carleton school enrollment varies 63× across entities

Carleton school enrollment ranges from 12 students (lowest) to 760 students (highest), a spread of 748 students. That ratio is an extreme outlier spread — among the widest gaps observed anywhere in this dataset. 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

Carleton operates one school district — a single-district system

Carleton'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

Carleton student-teacher ratio is 20.1:1 — 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. Airport Middle College 65
2. Airport Center for Education 43
3. Loren Eyler Elementary School 37
4. Wagar 56 Middle School 36
5. Joseph C Sterling Elementary School 35
6. Airport Senior High School 29
7. Wagar 78 Middle School 14

Most racially and ethnically mixed schools in Carleton

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 Loren Eyler Elementary School 33.8/100
  2. 2 Airport Center for Education 32.2/100
  3. 3 Wagar 56 Middle School 23.7/100
  4. 4 Wagar 78 Middle School 22.5/100
  5. 5 Airport Senior High School 17.1/100

What do families ask about schools in Carleton?

Which Carleton school has the highest Resource Investment Index? ▼

Airport Middle College has the highest Resource Investment Index among the Carleton schools in this federal-data comparison at 65/100. The index summarizes reported staffing, counseling, gifted-program, and attendance inputs; it is not an academic rating.

How many schools are in Carleton, MI? ▼

Carleton has 7 public schools with a total enrollment of 2,345 students. Average student-teacher ratio: 20.1:1.

Other Cities in Michigan

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131 schools
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50 schools
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Side-by-side: Compare any two schools or districts in Michigan →

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.