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Cuyama, California - 3 schools
At $20,064 per pupil, Cuyama Joint Unified ranks #236 of 1862 California districts by per-pupil spending (California districts). NCES F-33 finance data.
182
Total Enrollment
3
Schools
$20,064
Per-Pupil Spending
High, Elementary
School Types
District-Level NCES Analysis
Cuyama Joint Unified operates 3 public schools serving 182 students, placing it among the smallest districts in California. The school portfolio breaks down into 2 high, 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 Santa Barbara County.
Per-pupil expenditure runs $20,064 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 40.1% local, 50.1% state, and 9.8% federal, a state-revenue-heavy mix that insulates the district somewhat from local property-tax volatility, though it ties funding to state budget cycles.
a 130.8:1 student-counselor ratio, that meets the ASCA-recommended benchmark, and 38.8% chronic absenteeism from the 2021-22 Civil Rights Data Collection. Demographically, the student body averages 84.6% Hispanic or Latino, 14.2% White across the district's schools. Its most demographically mixed campus is Cuyama Elementary, with a diversity index of 39.6/100.
Its largest campus is Cuyama Elementary, enrolling 107 students (65% of the district's total enrollment). Its smallest is Sierra Madre High (Continuation), at 2 students, a 54x enrollment spread across the district's campuses.
Cuyama Elementary accounts for 58.8% of all Cuyama Joint Unified student enrollment
That is an overwhelming concentration, leaving the rest of Cuyama Joint Unified a distant remainder — means Cuyama Joint Unified-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.
Cuyama Joint Unified school enrollment varies 54× across entities
Cuyama Joint Unified school enrollment ranges from 2 students (lowest) to 107 students (highest), a spread of 105 students. That ratio is among the widest observed and reflects extreme enrollment heterogeneity, the district operates both small specialty programs and large comprehensive campuses inside a single budgeting unit. Per-school staffing ratios, programme availability, and capital-renovation cycles often diverge inside the same district based on enrollment shape.
Cuyama Joint Unified has higher-than-average Title I eligibility — 77.1% 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.
Cuyama Joint Unified student-counselor ratio is 131:1 — 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.
Cuyama Joint Unified chronic absenteeism rate is 38.8% — 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.