NCES CCD 2024-25 11 schools SC

Best-Resourced Schools in Gaffney, SC

Compiled from official source data by .

11 public K-12 schools in Gaffney 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
11
Schools
6,627
Students
41.3/100
Avg Resource Index
13.7:1
Avg Student-Teacher Ratio

National city placement

Middle-of-corpus city profile

According to NCES CCD 2024-25, Gaffney has more public-school enrollment than 67% of the 4,487 US cities in this directory. Gaffney 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

8 of Gaffney's 11 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

86.1% of enrollment in reporting Gaffney 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 25-point gap between Limestone-Central Elementary and Cherokee Charter 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 33%
School count
Top 35%
Resource Index average
52nd percentile
Teacher staffing
71st percentile

Gaffney High accounts for 27.6% of all Gaffney public-school enrollment

That dominant concentration means Gaffney-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

Gaffney school enrollment varies 6.9× across entities

Gaffney school enrollment ranges from 264 students (lowest) to 1,827 students (highest), a spread of 1,563 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

Gaffney reports 86.1% free-lunch eligibility

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.

Source: NCES Common Core of Data

Gaffney student-teacher ratio is 13.7:1 — 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. Limestone-Central Elementary 53
2. Corinth Elementary 52
3. John E. Ewing Middle 45
4. Northwest Elementary 44
5. Grassy Pond Elementary 42
6. Gaffney Middle 41
7. Draytonville Elementary 40
8. B. D. Lee Elementary 38
9. Luther L. Vaughan Elementary 36
10. Gaffney High 35
11. Cherokee Charter School 28

Most racially and ethnically mixed schools in Gaffney

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 Luther L. Vaughan Elementary 67.2/100
  2. 2 Gaffney Middle 64.9/100
  3. 3 Limestone-Central Elementary 62.8/100
  4. 4 Gaffney High 62.0/100
  5. 5 John E. Ewing Middle 56.1/100

What do families ask about schools in Gaffney?

Which Gaffney school has the highest Resource Investment Index? ▼

Limestone-Central Elementary has the highest Resource Investment Index among the Gaffney schools in this federal-data comparison at 53/100. The index summarizes reported staffing, counseling, gifted-program, and attendance inputs; it is not an academic rating.

How many schools are in Gaffney, SC? ▼

Gaffney has 11 public schools with a total enrollment of 6,627 students. 1 are charter schools. Average student-teacher ratio: 13.7:1.

Other Cities in South Carolina

Columbia
75 schools
Greenville
51 schools
Charleston
32 schools
North Charleston
30 schools
Spartanburg
29 schools
Rock Hill
27 schools

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

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.