NCES CCD 2024-25 7 schools PA

Best-Resourced Schools in Wilkes Barre, PA

Compiled from official source data by .

7 public K-12 schools in Wilkes Barre 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
4,167
Students
22.3/100
Avg Resource Index
20.2:1
Avg Student-Teacher Ratio

National city placement

Lean reported-resource profile

According to NCES CCD 2024-25, Wilkes Barre has more public-school enrollment than 46% of the 4,487 US cities in this directory. Wilkes Barre's average Resource Investment Index falls in the lower portion of the 4,487-city comparison set. The index is a resource snapshot, not an academic grade: it reflects the federal staffing, counselor, gifted-program, and attendance fields available for local campuses. The most useful next step is to open the individual schools below and identify which component is pulling each score down, because the same city average can hide very different campus-level constraints.

The school portfolio is elementary-weighted

4 of Wilkes Barre's 7 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.

Economic need crosses separate district systems

100.0% of enrollment in reporting Wilkes Barre 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 63-point gap between Wilkes-Barre Area Ctc and Wolfpack Early Learning Academy 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 54%
School count
Top 65%
Resource Index average
2nd percentile
Teacher staffing
15th percentile

G a R Ms accounts for 26.4% of all Wilkes Barre public-school enrollment

That concentration means Wilkes Barre-wide averages can mask substantial variation outside the largest entity. Grade level: Middle. 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

Wilkes Barre school enrollment varies 37× across entities

Wilkes Barre school enrollment ranges from 30 students (lowest) to 1,101 students (highest), a spread of 1,071 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

Wilkes Barre reports 100.0% 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

Wilkes Barre student-teacher ratio is 20.2:1 — 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. Wilkes-Barre Area Ctc 64
2. G a R Ms 24
3. Dr David W Kistler El Sch 23
4. Dodson El Sch 16
5. Heights/Murray El Sch 14
6. Daniel J Flood El Sch 14
7. Wolfpack Early Learning Academy 1

Most racially and ethnically mixed schools in Wilkes Barre

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 Wilkes-Barre Area Ctc 64.9/100
  2. 2 Daniel J Flood El Sch 58.7/100
  3. 3 Heights/Murray El Sch 58.1/100
  4. 4 Dr David W Kistler El Sch 57.4/100
  5. 5 G a R Ms 57.2/100

What do families ask about schools in Wilkes Barre?

Which Wilkes Barre school has the highest Resource Investment Index? ▼

Wilkes-Barre Area Ctc has the highest Resource Investment Index among the Wilkes Barre schools in this federal-data comparison at 64/100. The index summarizes reported staffing, counseling, gifted-program, and attendance inputs; it is not an academic rating.

How many schools are in Wilkes Barre, PA? ▼

Wilkes Barre has 7 public schools with a total enrollment of 4,167 students. Average student-teacher ratio: 20.2:1.

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

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.