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Hot Springs, Arkansas - 2 schools
An equity score of 65/100 ranks Cutter-Morning Star Sch. Dist. #68 of 250 districts in Arkansas (state average 50). Derived live from how evenly resources are distributed across the district's schools.
At $12,695 per pupil, Cutter-Morning Star Sch. Dist. ranks #80 of 255 Arkansas districts by per-pupil spending (Arkansas districts). NCES F-33 finance data.
690
Total Enrollment
2
Schools
$12,695
Per-Pupil Spending
Combined
School Types
District-Level NCES Analysis
Cutter-Morning Star Sch. Dist. operates 2 public schools serving 690 students, placing it among the smallest districts in Arkansas. The school portfolio breaks down into 2 combined 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 Garland County.
Per-pupil expenditure runs $12,695 according to the NCES F-33 School District Finance Survey, in the upper half of 255 Arkansas districts by per-pupil spending. See how Arkansas compares in our national per-pupil spending analysis. The funding mix is 27.8% local, 50.7% state, and 21.5% 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 65/100, ranked #68 of 250 in Arkansas against a state average of 50, notably more even than the typical district in the state for how evenly funding reaches its schools.
Academic infrastructure includes 1 of 2 schools offering Advanced Placement (4 AP courses district-wide), a 509.5:1 student-counselor ratio, above both the ASCA benchmark and the roughly 408:1 national average, and 36.7% chronic absenteeism from the 2021-22 Civil Rights Data Collection. Demographically, the student body averages 71.0% White, 13.6% Hispanic or Latino, 2.9% African American across the district's schools.
Cutter-Morning Star Elem. Sch. accounts for 51.7% of all Cutter-Morning Star Sch. Dist. student enrollment
That is an overwhelming concentration, leaving the rest of Cutter-Morning Star Sch. Dist. a distant remainder — means Cutter-Morning Star Sch. Dist.-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.
Cutter-Morning Star Sch. Dist. has higher-than-average Title I eligibility — 56.9% 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 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.
Cutter-Morning Star Sch. Dist. student-counselor ratio is 510:1 — well above typical (typically associated with unusually large scale or acute resource constraints)
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 above typical often signal acute resource constraints or a structurally different scale than most peers — worth reading alongside the underlying counts, not the ratio alone.
Cutter-Morning Star Sch. Dist. chronic absenteeism rate is 36.7% — 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.
Comparisons are relative to Cutter-Morning Star Sch. Dist.'s own figures; each column derives from NCES Common Core of Data and the F-33 Finance Survey.
Nearby Districts in Arkansas
Top districts in the same state, compare side-by-side for enrollment, spending, and demographics.