At $23,107 per pupil, Thunder Ridge Schools ranks #10 of 286 Kansas districts by per-pupil spending (Kansas districts). NCES F-33 finance data.
177
Total Enrollment
3
Schools
$23,107
Per-Pupil Spending
Elementary, High
School Types
District-Level NCES Analysis
Thunder Ridge Schools operates 3 public schools serving 177 students, placing it among the smallest districts in Kansas. The school portfolio breaks down into 2 elementary, 1 high 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 Smith County.
Per-pupil expenditure runs $23,107 according to the NCES F-33 School District Finance Survey, among the top 29 of 286 Kansas districts by per-pupil spending. See how Kansas compares in our national per-pupil spending analysis. The funding mix is 30.6% local, 61.1% state, and 8.3% 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 60:1 student-counselor ratio, that meets the ASCA-recommended benchmark, and 25.4% chronic absenteeism from the 2021-22 Civil Rights Data Collection. Demographically, the student body averages 89.5% White, 3.6% Hispanic or Latino, 1.0% African American across the district's schools. Its most demographically mixed campus is Thunder Ridge High School, with a diversity index of 26.8/100.
Its largest campus is Thunder Ridge Middle School, enrolling 72 students (42% of the district's total enrollment).
Thunder Ridge Middle School accounts for 40.7% of all Thunder Ridge Schools student enrollment
That dominant concentration means Thunder Ridge Schools-wide averages can mask substantial variation outside the largest entity. Grade band: elementary. The share measures enrollment concentration only; it does not establish how the district allocates programs, capital, or staff. Enrollment-weighted aggregates give this entity more weight than any smaller peer, while an unweighted entity average treats every record equally.
Thunder Ridge Schools student-counselor ratio is 60:1 — 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.
Thunder Ridge Schools chronic absenteeism rate is 25.4% — 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 Thunder Ridge Schools is typically wider than the Thunder Ridge Schools-aggregate figure suggests.