The top reported proficiency rate is 36% in English language arts. The lowest is 0% in Science.
Original Research by School Decision on Attica
Attica is a unified school district serving students from pre-kindergarten through twelfth grade in Harper County, Kansas. The district is a single small town’s system, drawing its student body from a community where the typical home is modestly valued and where housing costs have been rising at a clip above the national pace. A family moving here will find a district whose scale and setting define the experience more than any single program does.
Enrollment across all grades is small, which means class sections are few and each cohort is a tight group. The student body is overwhelmingly white, with a very small Hispanic share and a similarly small share of students identifying as two or more races. The available data did not report how many students qualify for free or reduced-price meals, how many receive special education services, or how many are English learners, so a parent relying on that lens into economic and learning support will want to ask the district directly. The district runs two school buildings: an elementary school and a high school.
On the state’s KAP assessments for the most recent testing year, results are mixed and come from small grade-level groups, which means a single cohort’s performance can swing the numbers sharply. In fourth-grade math, roughly half of students scored at or above proficient. In sixth-grade math, that figure dipped to about two-fifths. Eighth-grade math showed zero students reaching the proficient threshold. In English language arts, fourth graders performed reasonably well, with a majority proficient. Sixth-grade ELA dropped to about a third proficient, and eighth-grade ELA fell to just under a fifth. Eighth-grade science recorded no proficient scores. The state changed the cut scores for math, English language arts, and science in this testing cycle, so the results cannot be directly compared to prior years. A parent should treat these as a single-year baseline rather than a trend.
There is no reported four-year graduation rate for the district. The data gap may be related to the grade band or the small enrollment, but the reason was not specified in the available information.
The Kansas state assessment data for high school grades was not present in the material reviewed. A family with a secondary student will want to ask the high school directly about course offerings, dual-credit arrangements, and postsecondary preparation, as those details were not captured here.
Housing in the Attica area is notably affordable relative to the state as a whole. The weighted typical home value across the district’s zip codes falls well below the state median, though values have been rising at a double-digit annual rate. The core zip code for Attica itself shows the strongest yearly appreciation. A family looking to buy will find entry-level price points that are hard to match in more urban parts of Kansas.
The district is the only one in Harper County, so there is no county-level peer group to place it against on proficiency, spending, or absenteeism. A family weighing Attica against other options will need to look beyond the county line to the surrounding region.
The district’s academic data shows a pattern that is typical of very small rural systems: some grade levels perform at a competitive level, while others, especially the middle grades, show very low proficiency rates. For a parent, the question is whether the school’s small size and community environment, along with the very low-cost housing market, offset the uneven test results. A call to the school to discuss how it supports students who are not yet at grade level, particularly in middle school math and science, would be a reasonable next step for any family considering a move here.
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