The top reported proficiency rate is 34% in Math. The lowest is 27% in English language arts.
Original Research by School Decision on Marmaduke High School
Marmaduke High School serves seventh through twelfth graders in a small, rural town in the Arkansas Delta. The town itself, Marmaduke, sits just east of Crowley’s Ridge and is the kind of place where U.S. Route 49 and Arkansas Highway 34 cross at the center, with a handful of manufacturers and surrounding farmland producing soybeans, rice, corn, and cotton. Many residents commute to factories in nearby Paragould, the county seat. The school is the only high school in the Marmaduke School District, and the district as a whole has had no major changes publicly reported in recent years, so the experience a family finds today is likely stable.
Academically, the picture is mixed and warrants close attention. The school participates in Arkansas’s ATLAS state assessments, and results for seventh and eighth graders in math, English language arts, and science are available. In both math and ELA, the share of students scoring proficient or above is below the midpoint among districts in Greene County; the school sits in the bottom quartile on the overall proficiency index. Seventh-grade math proficiency was modest, and eighth-grade math was lower still. ELA results showed a similar pattern, with eighth-grade proficiency notably weaker than seventh. Science proficiency for both tested grades was around the same range. High school state testing data for grades nine through twelve was not reported in the available information, which may reflect the state’s testing schedule or reporting choices. A parent looking at this school should ask the school directly about academic outcomes for its older students—graduation rates, college readiness, and any end-of-course exam results. The school’s website and the district office are the right places to start for that missing detail.
The student body is very small, with roughly the enrollment you would expect for a rural school serving seven grades. Racially, the school is overwhelmingly white, with only a handful of Hispanic students and a small number of multiracial and American Indian students represented. Just over half of students come from families with income low enough to qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, a moderate poverty rate that is common in the region. Special education and English learner counts were not provided, so it is unclear what support services are available for those populations. The school is not a charter or magnet school, and Title I status was not specified.
Housing in the Marmaduke area is relatively affordable when compared with state and national benchmarks, reflecting the town’s rural character. Home values have seen modest recent growth, and the area’s unemployment rate is near the national average. The town’s population has been slowly increasing since the last census, and it largely recovered from a damaging tornado in recent years. New housing developments were not identified, so the existing stock of homes—some of which may have been rebuilt after the storm—makes up the local market.
For a family considering Marmadude High School, the primary draw is the setting: a tight-knit, small-town environment where a student can experience both middle and high school in one building, with the intimacy that implies. The academic performance on state tests in the middle grades is lower than many surrounding districts, so parents who prioritize strong test-based outcomes should investigate further—both to understand the school’s own interpretation of these scores and to see what academic programming exists for high school students, including any advanced coursework, career and technical education, or dual enrollment opportunities. No program offerings were listed in the available data, so that is another gap worth pursuing directly. The peer environment is homogeneous in race and modest in income, which may suit some families and give others pause. The town itself offers a quiet, rural lifestyle with basic services and a short commute to Paragould for more amenities. This is not a school or community with broad national recognition; it is a straightforward, locally focused public school serving a rural district where personal relationships and community ties are likely the backbone of daily life.
See more original research from School Decision →