International Falls School District

The International Falls School District in Minnesota operates two schools: Falls Secondary, serving grades 6-12, and Falls Elementary, serving grades PK-5. While both schools have a predominantly white student population, the data reveals a notable performance gap, with Falls Elementary consistently outperforming Falls Secondary on key metrics such as test scores and statewide rankings.

Falls Elementary appears to be the stronger performing school, with a higher 3-star statewide ranking from SchoolDigger compared to 2 stars for Falls Secondary. The elementary school also outperforms the high school and district/state averages on most MCA-III test score metrics, particularly in math and reading. Additionally, Falls Elementary has a lower student-teacher ratio of 13.1, compared to 19.1 at Falls Secondary.

In contrast, Falls Secondary has seen a decline in its statewide ranking over the past few years, dropping from 133 out of 472 Minnesota high schools in 2021-2022 to 299 out of 480 in 2023-2024. The high school's MCA-III math and reading proficiency rates were also below the district and state averages across the board. These findings suggest the need for the International Falls School District to closely examine the performance and resource disparities between its elementary and secondary schools, and to develop strategies to address any underlying issues that may be contributing to the observed differences.