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Chualar, California - 1 schools
An equity score of 76/100 ranks Chualar Union #155 of 1517 districts in California (state average 50). Derived live from how evenly resources are distributed across the district's schools.
At $17,025 per pupil, Chualar Union ranks #534 of 1862 California districts by per-pupil spending (California districts). NCES F-33 finance data.
278
Total Enrollment
1
Schools
$17,025
Per-Pupil Spending
Elementary
School Types
District-Level NCES Analysis
Chualar Union operates 1 public schools serving 278 students, placing it among the smallest districts in California. The school portfolio breaks down into 1 elementary 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 Monterey County.
Per-pupil expenditure runs $17,025 according to the NCES F-33 School District Finance Survey, in the upper half of 1862 California districts by per-pupil spending. See how California compares in our national per-pupil spending analysis. The funding mix is 24.6% local, 64.4% state, and 11.0% federal, a state-revenue-heavy mix that insulates the district somewhat from local property-tax volatility, though it ties funding to state budget cycles. The district's equity score is 76/100, ranked #155 of 1517 in California against a state average of 50, notably more even than the typical district in the state for how evenly funding reaches its schools.
and 35.0% chronic absenteeism from the 2021-22 Civil Rights Data Collection. Demographically, the student body averages 98.7% Hispanic or Latino, 0.9% White across the district's schools.
Its largest campus is Chualar Elementary, enrolling 234 students (100% of the district's total enrollment).
Chualar Elementary accounts for 84.2% of all Chualar Union student enrollment
That is an overwhelming concentration, leaving the rest of Chualar Union a distant remainder — means Chualar Union-wide averages can mask substantial variation outside the dominant entity. Grade band: elementary. 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.
Chualar Union has higher-than-average Title I eligibility — 81.7% of the population qualifies for free or reduced-price lunch
free or reduced-price lunch eligibility is the federal threshold for Title I funding allocations, established under the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA, 2015). Areas above 75% eligibility — including this one — receive concentration grants on top of the basic Title I formula. Regions with eligibility this high typically draw a substantially larger federal funding share relative to their local tax base, which can either offset or reinforce existing gaps depending on allocation policy.
Chualar Union chronic absenteeism rate is 35.0% — 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.