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Big Sandy, Montana - 3 schools
At $16,989 per pupil, Big Sandy K-12 ranks #181 of 394 Montana districts by per-pupil spending (Montana districts). NCES F-33 finance data.
197
Total Enrollment
3
Schools
$16,989
Per-Pupil Spending
Combined, High
School Types
District-Level NCES Analysis
Big Sandy K-12 operates 3 public schools serving 197 students, placing it among the smallest districts in Montana. The school portfolio breaks down into 1 combined, 1 high, 1 middle schools, a small enough portfolio that most families will interact with nearly every campus in the district at some point. These enrollment and school figures come from the NCES Common Core of Data (CCD) 2024-25 release, and the district is based in Chouteau County.
Per-pupil expenditure runs $16,989 according to the NCES F-33 School District Finance Survey, in the upper half of 394 Montana districts by per-pupil spending. See how Montana compares in our national per-pupil spending analysis. The funding mix is 48.5% local, 35.9% state, and 15.6% federal, a balanced mix across local, state, and federal sources, spreading budget risk across funding cycles rather than concentrating it in one.
Academic infrastructure includes 1 of 3 schools offering Advanced Placement (1 AP courses district-wide), a 60.3:1 student-counselor ratio, that meets the ASCA-recommended benchmark, and 31.3% chronic absenteeism from the 2021-22 Civil Rights Data Collection. Demographically, the student body averages 75.2% White, 6.3% Hispanic or Latino, 0.6% Asian across the district's schools. Its most demographically mixed campus is Big Sandy High School, with a diversity index of 44.1/100.
Its largest campus is F E Miley School, enrolling 94 students (52% of the district's total enrollment). Its smallest is Big Sandy 7-8, at 28 students, a 3x enrollment spread across the district's campuses.
F E Miley School accounts for 47.7% of all Big Sandy K-12 student enrollment
That is an overwhelming concentration, leaving the rest of Big Sandy K-12 a distant remainder — means Big Sandy K-12-wide averages can mask substantial variation outside the dominant entity. Grade band: combined. A single dominant campus often anchors a district's program offerings and staffing patterns; the share helps explain why district-wide averages may not reflect the typical neighbourhood-school experience. When one entity dominates a region's footprint, its programmatic and budget decisions effectively set policy for a majority of the affected population.
Big Sandy K-12 school enrollment varies 3.4× across entities
Big Sandy K-12 school enrollment ranges from 28 students (lowest) to 94 students (highest), a spread of 66 students. That relatively narrow ratio reflects an unusually homogeneous campus portfolio, most districts have a wider mix of school sizes. Per-school staffing ratios, programme availability, and capital-renovation cycles often diverge inside the same district based on enrollment shape.
Big Sandy K-12 student-counselor ratio is 60:1 — well below typical (typically associated with unusually small scale or exceptionally high per-unit investment)
student-counselor ratio is the simplest comparative metric but it does not capture the full picture: the ratio counts FTE counselors against total enrollment, districts that contract intervention or social-emotional staff outside the counselor classification may be under-counted Values this far below typical often correlate with unusually small scale or population characteristics rather than higher resource budgets per se — worth checking whether the underlying denominator is itself an outlier.
Big Sandy K-12 chronic absenteeism rate is 31.3% — high (typically associated with higher-than-average disruption; recent CRDC data showed elevated rates persisting after pandemic-era schooling changes)
chronic absenteeism rate is the simplest comparative metric but it does not capture the full picture: a student is chronically absent if they miss ≥10% of enrolled days for any reason, illness, family obligations, or disengagement Higher values may reflect larger urban scale or recent resource constraints that have widened the gap.