Compiled from official source data by PlainSchools.
40 public K-12 schools in Harrisburg from NCES Common Core of Data: enrollment, grade span, demographics, and Civil Rights Data Collection statistics for every active campus.
According to NCES CCD 2024-25, Harrisburg has more public-school enrollment than 99% of the 4,487 US cities in this directory. Harrisburg is among the largest city school systems in this directory by enrollment, but its campuses are divided among 11 districts. That combination matters: citywide averages blend separate budgets, staffing policies, attendance boundaries, and program rules. For a family comparing schools here, the district column is as important as the city average; two nearby campuses may answer to different boards and draw on different F-33 funding pools.
The school portfolio is elementary-weighted
22 of Harrisburg's 40 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 6 middle and 7 high-school records. Families comparing later grades should rely on those individual rows rather than the all-school mean.
Economic-need coverage is incomplete
Free-lunch eligibility is reported for schools covering 38.6% of Harrisburg's listed enrollment. Because the remaining enrollment is outside that calculation, the measured percentage should not be generalized to every local student. The Resource Investment Index uses other reported federal fields and has its own coverage limits. Treat the city figures as a map of available records: inspect a campus's source fields before using economic need or resource position in a comparison.
City enrollment
Top 1%
School count
Top 5%
Resource Index average
35th percentile
Teacher staffing
38th percentile
Commonwealth Charter Academy Cs accounts for 50.7% of all Harrisburg public-school enrollment
That is an overwhelming concentration, leaving the rest of Harrisburg a distant remainder — means Harrisburg-wide averages can mask substantial variation outside the largest entity. Grade level: Combined. The share measures enrollment concentration only; it does not establish how districts allocate programs, capital, or staff. Because it contains a majority of the affected population, enrollment-weighted aggregates will sit closer to this entity's reported fields than to those of smaller peers; an unweighted entity count answers a different question.
Harrisburg school enrollment varies 337× across entities
Harrisburg school enrollment ranges from 87 students (lowest) to 29,320 students (highest), a spread of 29,233 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.
The reported share is at least 75%, indicating a high concentration of measured economic need. 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.
Harrisburg operates 11 school districts — one of the single most fragmented governance structures in the country
Each school district has independent budgeting, hiring, and service delivery authority, and the sheer count here puts it in the extreme tail of fragmentation nationally. The fragmentation reflects historical patterns of inter-municipal boundary lines that pre-date modern city growth, students in different parts of the same city can attend different districts with different per-pupil spending, calendars, and graduation requirements. Per-region variation is largest in fragmented systems because each school district sets its own budget, contracts, and priorities without higher-level coordination above the regulatory floor.
Harrisburg student-teacher ratio is 16.5:1 — 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 Harrisburg is typically wider than the Harrisburg-aggregate figure suggests.
18% of the city's listed public-school campuses are reported as charter schools in NCES CCD. Charter status identifies a different governance arrangement; it does not establish admissions availability, academic quality, or the share of city students enrolled in those campuses. Open each school record to compare enrollment and staffing directly.
Most racially and ethnically mixed schools in Harrisburg
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.
Which Harrisburg school has the highest Resource Investment Index? ▼
Reach Cyber Cs has the highest Resource Investment Index among the Harrisburg schools in this federal-data comparison at 61/100. The index summarizes reported staffing, counseling, gifted-program, and attendance inputs; it is not an academic rating.
How many schools are in Harrisburg, PA? ▼
Harrisburg has 40 public schools with a total enrollment of 57,796 students. 7 are charter schools. Average student-teacher ratio: 16.5:1.
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.
