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Missoula, Montana - 2 schools
At $18,614 per pupil, Desmet Elem ranks #151 of 394 Montana districts by per-pupil spending (Montana districts). NCES F-33 finance data.
127
Total Enrollment
2
Schools
$18,614
Per-Pupil Spending
Combined, Middle
School Types
District-Level NCES Analysis
Desmet Elem operates 2 public schools serving 127 students, placing it among the smallest districts in Montana. The school portfolio breaks down into 1 combined, 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 Missoula County.
Per-pupil expenditure runs $18,614 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 55.2% local, 22.2% state, and 22.6% federal, a local-revenue-heavy mix that leaves the district more exposed to property-tax swings and local ballot measures than state-funded peers.
a 102.3:1 student-counselor ratio, that meets the ASCA-recommended benchmark, and 40.3% chronic absenteeism from the 2021-22 Civil Rights Data Collection. Demographically, the student body averages 83.3% White, 3.3% Hispanic or Latino, 3.0% Asian across the district's schools.
Its largest campus is Desmet School, enrolling 90 students (71% of the district's total enrollment).
Desmet School accounts for 70.9% of all Desmet Elem student enrollment
That is an overwhelming concentration, leaving the rest of Desmet Elem a distant remainder — means Desmet Elem-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.
Desmet Elem student-counselor ratio is 102:1 — 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.
Desmet Elem chronic absenteeism rate is 40.3% — 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.