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Reading, Pennsylvania - 4 schools
An equity score of 27/100 ranks Muhlenberg Sd #547 of 648 districts in Pennsylvania (state average 49). Derived live from how evenly resources are distributed across the district's schools.
At $13,599 per pupil, Muhlenberg Sd ranks #637 of 671 Pennsylvania districts by per-pupil spending (Pennsylvania districts). NCES F-33 finance data.
4,266
Total Enrollment
4
Schools
$13,599
Per-Pupil Spending
Elementary, High
School Types
District-Level NCES Analysis
Muhlenberg Sd operates 4 public schools serving 4,266 students, placing it among the smallest districts in Pennsylvania. The school portfolio breaks down into 2 elementary, 1 high, 1 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 Berks County.
Per-pupil expenditure runs $13,599 according to the NCES F-33 School District Finance Survey, among the bottom 68 of 671 Pennsylvania districts by per-pupil spending. See how Pennsylvania compares in our national per-pupil spending analysis. The funding mix is 60.5% local, 27.6% state, and 11.8% federal, a local-revenue-heavy mix that leaves the district more exposed to property-tax swings and local ballot measures than state-funded peers. The district's equity score is 27/100, ranked #547 of 648 in Pennsylvania against a state average of 49, notably less even than the typical district in the state for how evenly funding reaches its schools.
Academic infrastructure includes 2 of 4 schools offering Advanced Placement (21 AP courses district-wide), a 394.9:1 student-counselor ratio, well above the ASCA benchmark though still under the roughly 408:1 national average, and 20.1% chronic absenteeism from the 2021-22 Civil Rights Data Collection. Demographically, the student body averages 56.0% Hispanic or Latino, 24.3% White, 7.5% African American across the district's schools. Its most demographically mixed campus is Muhlenberg El Ctr, with a diversity index of 69.8/100.
Its largest campus is Muhlenberg El Ctr, enrolling 1,241 students (28% of the district's total enrollment).
Muhlenberg El Ctr accounts for 28.1% of all Muhlenberg Sd student enrollment
That dominant concentration means Muhlenberg Sd-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.
Muhlenberg Sd has higher-than-average Title I eligibility — 91.7% 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). Eligibility here is a supermajority of the population — well past the 75% concentration-grant threshold that unlocks extra funding 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.
Muhlenberg Sd student-counselor ratio is 395:1 — high (typically associated with staffing constraints that limit per-student counselor time; CRDC data shows higher ratios cluster in larger urban systems)
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 Higher values may reflect larger urban scale or recent resource constraints that have widened the gap.
Muhlenberg Sd chronic absenteeism rate is 20.1% — near the typical range (US average ~28) — aligned with the national post-pandemic baseline of roughly 28% chronic absenteeism
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 Variation between sub-units within Muhlenberg Sd is typically wider than the Muhlenberg Sd-aggregate figure suggests.