NCES CCD 2024-25 10 schools MS

Best-Resourced Schools in Picayune, MS

Compiled from official source data by .

10 public K-12 schools in Picayune 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
10
Schools
3,859
Students
41/100
Avg Resource Index
13.9:1
Avg Student-Teacher Ratio

National city placement

Middle-of-corpus city profile

According to NCES CCD 2024-25, Picayune has more public-school enrollment than 42% of the 4,487 US cities in this directory. Picayune sits in the broad middle of the national city distribution rather than at a single obvious extreme. Its scale, average Resource Investment Index, and staffing position need to be read together: a middle placement on one measure does not cancel a stronger or weaker result on another. The percentile panel makes those dimensions explicit, and the school table shows where the city aggregate breaks into materially different campus profiles.

Combined-grade campuses shape the local portfolio

4 of Picayune's 10 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.

Economic need crosses separate district systems

97.7% of enrollment in reporting Picayune schools is eligible for free lunch, while the city list spans 2 districts. That pairing makes a citywide average especially easy to misread: the need measure follows students, but staffing decisions, calendars, program rules, and federal allocations are administered through separate district structures. The 45-point gap between Early Head Start Rosa Street and Picayune Junior High School shows how much reported resource capacity can vary inside the same municipal label. Compare schools within the same district first, then use the city view to see how those local systems differ.

City enrollment
Top 58%
School count
Top 41%
Resource Index average
50th percentile
Teacher staffing
68th percentile

Picayune Memorial High School accounts for 24.4% of all Picayune public-school enrollment

That concentration means Picayune-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

Picayune school enrollment varies 6.2× across entities

Picayune school enrollment ranges from 151 students (lowest) to 940 students (highest), a spread of 789 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

Picayune reports 97.7% free-lunch eligibility

The reported share is above 87.5%, so economic need is widespread across the measured student population. 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

Picayune student-teacher ratio is 13.9:1 — 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. Early Head Start Rosa Street 67
2. Early Head Start Nicholson 63
3. West Hancock Elementary School 45
4. Nicholson Elementary School 43
5. South Side Elementary School 38
6. Roseland Park Elementary School 36
7. South Side Lower Elementary School 36
8. Picayune Memorial High School 32
9. West Side Elementary School 28
10. Picayune Junior High School 22

Most racially and ethnically mixed schools in Picayune

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 Nicholson Elementary School 66.0/100
  2. 2 Early Head Start Nicholson 63.5/100
  3. 3 Roseland Park Elementary School 58.5/100
  4. 4 Picayune Junior High School 58.1/100
  5. 5 West Side Elementary School 56.8/100

What do families ask about schools in Picayune?

Which Picayune school has the highest Resource Investment Index? ▼

Early Head Start Rosa Street has the highest Resource Investment Index among the Picayune schools in this federal-data comparison at 67/100. The index summarizes reported staffing, counseling, gifted-program, and attendance inputs; it is not an academic rating.

How many schools are in Picayune, MS? ▼

Picayune has 10 public schools with a total enrollment of 3,859 students. Average student-teacher ratio: 13.9:1.

Other Cities in Mississippi

Jackson
58 schools
Gulfport
23 schools
Hattiesburg
18 schools
Meridian
18 schools
Olive Branch
14 schools
Biloxi
13 schools

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

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.