Delaware runs 223 public schools across 42 districts, with a 14.1:1 average classroom and — of students on subsidized lunch.
223
public schools
42
school districts
14.1:1
avg student–teacher
—
free/reduced lunch
What the NCES Data Says About Delaware Schools
Delaware operates 223 public K-12 schools organised into 42 independent school districts serving 140,539 students, per the National Center for Education Statistics Common Core of Data 2024-25. The largest district, Red Clay Consolidated School District, enrolls 14,771 pupils across 28 schools at $21,267 per student, while smaller rural districts can run fewer than a dozen campuses. This fragmentation — inherited from century-old township governance patterns in many states — is why per-pupil spending, class sizes, and programme availability vary dramatically inside a single state boundary.
Statewide, the average student-teacher ratio is 14.1:1, a useful benchmark for comparing any individual district or school on PlainSchools. The district table below is sortable by enrollment, school count, and per-pupil expenditure — the three fields that best predict a district's financial and demographic profile. For schools specifically, use the rankings links above to view per-category leaderboards covering spending, class size, best schools by composite quality score, chronic absenteeism, and funding-equity distribution within the state.
Every district figure here pulls from two distinct federal surveys: enrollment and demographic data come from the NCES Common Core of Data 2024-25 (school membership and directory), while per-pupil spending, teacher salaries, and federal/state/local revenue shares originate in the NCES F-33 School District Finance Survey (typically FY 2021-22). Civil-rights indicators — gifted enrollment, AP course counts, counselor staffing, chronic absenteeism, in- and out-of-school suspensions — come from the 2021-22 Civil Rights Data Collection. Cross-referencing these three sources is what lets PlainSchools produce composite scores and equity rankings that single-source tools cannot.
Delaware's average class size vs. every US state
Average students per teacher, state by state (lower means smaller classes)
14smaller classes than 59% of 51 US states
Each bar is a band; taller bars hold more US states. The dashed line + filled bar mark this entry. Hover or tap any bar for its full count, share, and where it sits relative to this entry.
Source U.S. Department of Education — NCES Common Core of Data · 2024-25
Federal data — no proprietary formula.
PlainSchools publishes the actual federal survey data — enrollment, staffing, finance, and demographics from NCES — without a composite rating on top. The insights below are computed directly from those datasets; every number traces to a cited source.
Delaware per-pupil spending varies 3.4× across districts
Per-pupil spending in Delaware ranges from $9,658 (lowest district) to $32,837 (highest), a spread of $23,179. That relatively narrow ratio reflects an unusually equalised funding system — most states have wider gaps. High-spending districts typically draw on higher property tax bases, a structural feature of state education finance under the federal Title I framework that sets the floor but not the ceiling.
Delaware operates only 42 school districts — among the most consolidated K-12 governance structures in the country
Most Delaware districts are countywide or multi-county systems. Consolidation produces narrower per-pupil spending variance because resources pool across larger student populations, but it can also mask intra-district inequities — school-by-school differences within a single district are not visible at the state-aggregation level. Consolidated states typically rely more heavily on state-level funding formulas than on local property tax variability.
Average Delaware student-teacher ratio is 14.1:1 — near the U.S. average of approximately 16:1
Student-teacher ratio is the simplest staffing metric reported on NCES Common Core of Data, but it does not capture push-in specialists, intervention staff, English Language Learner aides, special education co-teachers, or counseling and support staff. Variation between districts within the state is wider than the state-average figure suggests — large urban districts may run 20:1 while small rural districts run 10:1, both inside the same average. Class-load comparisons are most meaningful at the district or school level, not the state aggregate.
Largest K-12 public schools by total students enrolled
students
Newark Charter School
3,109
Newark Charter School
3,109 students
100.0% of the leader · rank #1 · Newark, DE
Odyssey Charter School
2,286
Odyssey Charter School
2,286 students
73.5% of the leader · rank #2 · Wilmington, DE
Caesar Rodney High Sch…
2,254
Caesar Rodney High School
2,254 students
72.5% of the leader · rank #3 · Camden, DE
Penn (William) High Sc…
2,069
Penn (William) High School
2,069 students
66.5% of the leader · rank #4 · New Castle, DE
Sussex Central High Sc…
2,012
Sussex Central High School
2,012 students
64.7% of the leader · rank #5 · Georgetown, DE
Cape Henlopen High Sch…
1,889
Cape Henlopen High School
1,889 students
60.8% of the leader · rank #6 · Lewes, DE
Dover High School
1,812
Dover High School
1,812 students
58.3% of the leader · rank #7 · Dover, DE
Smyrna High School
1,777
Smyrna High School
1,777 students
57.2% of the leader · rank #8 · Smyrna, DE
What this shows The largest public schools in Delaware by enrollment — often statewide virtual academies or large consolidated campuses, so size here reflects reach, not quality.
Source: National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) Common Core of Data (CCD) — Public school universe · 2023-2024 Public K-12 school enrollment, demographics, and operational data; collected annually by NCES from state education agencies.