Tennessee runs 1,844 public schools across 148 districts, with a 15.6:1 average classroom and — of students on subsidized lunch.
1,844
public schools
148
school districts
15.6:1
avg student–teacher
—
free/reduced lunch
What the NCES Data Says About Tennessee Schools
Tennessee operates 1,844 public K-12 schools organised into 148 independent school districts serving 994,264 students, per the National Center for Education Statistics Common Core of Data 2022-23. The largest district, Memphis-Shelby County Schools, enrolls 109,797 pupils across 222 schools at $15,292 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 15.6:1, 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 2022-23 (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.
Tennessee's average class size vs. every US state
Average students per teacher, state by state (lower means smaller classes)
16smaller classes than 35% 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.
Tennessee per-pupil spending varies 4.7× across districts
Per-pupil spending in Tennessee ranges from $5,977 (lowest district) to $27,867 (highest), a spread of $21,890. That spread reflects typical state-level variation between high-property-value suburbs and rural or low-tax-base districts. 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.
Average Tennessee student-teacher ratio is 15.6:1 — 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
Collierville High School
2,946
Collierville High School
2,946 students
100.0% of the leader · rank #1 · Collierville, TN
Bartlett High School
2,782
Bartlett High School
2,782 students
94.4% of the leader · rank #2 · Bartlett, TN
Stewarts Creek High Sc…
2,474
Stewarts Creek High School
2,474 students
84.0% of the leader · rank #3 · Smyrna, TN
Science Hill High School
2,359
Science Hill High School
2,359 students
80.1% of the leader · rank #4 · Johnson City, TN
Dobyns - Bennett High …
2,315
Dobyns - Bennett High School
2,315 students
78.6% of the leader · rank #5 · Kingsport, TN
Blackman High School
2,301
Blackman High School
2,301 students
78.1% of the leader · rank #6 · Murfreesboro, TN
Riverdale High School
2,275
Riverdale High School
2,275 students
77.2% of the leader · rank #7 · Murfreesboro, TN
Smyrna High School
2,266
Smyrna High School
2,266 students
76.9% of the leader · rank #8 · Smyrna, TN
What this shows The largest public schools in Tennessee 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.