The top reported proficiency rate is 10% in Science. The lowest is 6% in Math.
Original Research by School Decision on Yerger Junior High School
Yerger Junior High School serves seventh and eighth graders in the Hope School District, a small city in southwest Arkansas that is the county seat of Hempstead County. Hope’s economy has long been rooted in manufacturing, including Klipsch Audio Technologies, poultry processing, bakery goods, and the production of steel joists, auto parts, and molded plastics. The town has a strong agricultural identity tied to watermelon cultivation and its annual Watermelon Festival. Population has been declining over recent decades, and the overall trajectory is one of contraction rather than growth. Hope is bisected by Union Pacific Railway tracks, and its schools are spread across separate campuses rather than clustered downtown. The restored Missouri-Pacific Railroad depot, now a visitor center and museum, also serves as an Amtrak stop. The President William Jefferson Clinton Birthplace Home National Historic Site is located here, along with the Klipsch Museum of Audio History and the University of Arkansas Hope-Texarkana community college.
Yerger Junior High sits within a district where every enrolled student qualifies for free or reduced-price meals, a reflection of the broader economic context of the community. The school enrolls a modest number of students for a two-grade junior high, drawing from Hope and the surrounding area. The student body is majority Black, with a substantial Hispanic population and a smaller White share; a small portion of students identify as two or more races.
State testing results on the Arkansas ATLAS assessment place the school in the bottom quartile among districts in Hempstead County across all tested subjects and grades. In seventh grade math, the share of students reaching proficiency was low. In eighth grade math, it was lower still. English language arts results were also low in both grades. In science, roughly one in ten seventh graders and a similar share of eighth graders scored proficient. These are consistent patterns across subjects and grade levels, and a parent may want to look into this further with the school to understand what academic supports and interventions are in place.
Because the school serves only seventh and eighth grades, there is no graduation rate to report, and no college or career readiness metrics such as AP, dual-credit, or CTE pathway data are available for this campus. The district brief turned up little in the way of recent major changes or strategic priorities publicly reported at the district level, so that context is absent rather than omitted.
For a family considering Yerger Junior High, the picture is one of a small, transportation-dependent community with a declining population and a manufacturing and agricultural economic base. The school is fully enrolled with students from low-income households. The academic proficiency numbers across math, English, and science are well below the district averages in the county. The school’s grade band means it serves as a transitional two-year junior high, so families will want to understand how the district prepares students for high school coursework and what the academic trajectory looks like from Yerger to Hope High School. Without program offerings or staffing data available in the record, the full scope of elective and enrichment opportunities is not captured here.
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