Glen Lake Community School, Maple City MI

Original Research by School Decision on Glen Lake Community School

Glen Lake Community School is a single-campus public school serving pre-kindergarten through twelfth grade in Maple City, a tiny unincorporated community in Leelanau County. The school draws from a rural, farm-centered area where the village center holds little more than a couple of restaurants, a convenience store, and a post office. There is no real downtown, walkability is minimal, and the nearest full-service grocery is a few miles down a country road. Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore sits roughly ten miles to the northwest, and Traverse City is about thirteen miles to the southeast. The community has been described as sleepy and generational, with a population that has stayed flat to slightly declining and no major housing or commercial development on the horizon.

The school itself is modest in size for a building that spans every grade from pre-kindergarten through senior year. Its student body is overwhelmingly white, with a small number of students identifying as Hispanic, multiracial, Black, or American Indian. About a third of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch. Data on English learners and students with individualized education programs was not reported, so those population shares are unknown here.

On state assessments, Glen Lake's results tell a mixed but generally encouraging story. English language arts is the school's clear strength. Proficiency across the tested elementary and middle grades mostly sits in the moderate range, with third grade just under half of tested students proficient, fourth and fifth grades above half, and sixth and seventh dipping back. The standout is eighth grade, where the PSAT-based ELA proficiency rate is remarkably high, with nearly all tested students reaching proficiency. Science is also a bright spot, with both tested grades posting strong proficiency. Eighth-grade social studies is similarly strong, while fifth-grade social studies is more middling.

Math is the softer area. Third-grade math starts well, with more than half of students proficient, but proficiency drops in the middle elementary grades and settles into a lower band through fifth, sixth, and seventh grades before rebounding somewhat in eighth. The pattern is common in many schools, but the dip is large enough that a parent of an upper-elementary student may want to look into this further with the school to understand what supports are in place.

Measured against its county peers, Glen Lake's overall proficiency index sits above the midpoint among the five districts in Leelanau County. That positions it as a relatively strong performer in its local context, though not the top district in the county.

Graduation rate data was not available for this school, and chronic absenteeism figures were also missing. The absence of a graduation rate for a school that serves through twelfth grade is a gap a parent would want to fill directly, perhaps by asking the school for its most recent cohort graduation and postsecondary enrollment information. Information on advanced coursework, career and technical education, dual-enrollment options, staffing levels, discipline, and attendance was not provided, so those program details cannot be characterized here.

The housing market around Maple City is expensive relative to both state and national benchmarks. Typical home values run well above what most Michigan communities see, and the price-to-income ratio is steep. For a family considering a move into the attendance area, the cost of entry is a real factor. Rents, where available, are more moderate than the purchase market, but the rental stock in a community this small is likely thin.

What Glen Lake offers is a small, rural, continuous pre-kindergarten-through-twelfth-grade environment in a scenic part of northern Michigan, with solid reading and science outcomes and a peer group that is stable and locally rooted. The trade-offs are a math program that shows weakness in the middle grades, limited public data on graduation and program offerings, and a housing market that demands a substantial budget. A family drawn to the area's natural setting and small-school continuity should weigh those strengths against the gaps and ask the school directly for the numbers that were not available here.

See more original research from School Decision →

Academic performance

State test results and graduation outcomes.

Graduation rate (ACGR)

>=95%Cohort of 77 students · Class of 2021

The federal source publishes a banded range instead of an exact rate when the graduating cohort is small enough that an exact number could risk identifying individual students.

How this school compares to all schools in this state

Each dot is one school’s SY 2020-21 graduation rate, binned by integer rate. Taller columns mean more schools at that rate. This school is highlighted.

1,027 schools plotted. 80 additional schools' rates are federally suppressed and not shown. Data: EDFacts SY 2020-21.

Math

Grade 357%

School 57% · District 57%

▲ 15 pts above state median

Grade 439%

School 39% · District 39%

▲ 1 pts above state median

Grade 535%

School 35% · District 35%

▲ 3 pts above state median

Grade 639%

School 39% · District 39%

▲ 11 pts above state median

Grade 750%

School 50% · District 50%

▲ 21 pts above state median

Grade 853%

School 53% · District 53%

▲ 26 pts above state median

English language arts

Grade 348%

School 48% · District 48%

▲ 10 pts above state median

Grade 452%

School 52% · District 52%

▲ 11 pts above state median

Grade 560%

School 60% · District 60%

▲ 18 pts above state median

Grade 648%

School 48% · District 48%

▲ 14 pts above state median

Grade 744%

School 44% · District 44%

▲ 10 pts above state median

Grade 886%

School 86% · District 86%

▲ 24 pts above state median

Science

Grade 566%

School 66% · District 66%

▲ 26 pts above state median

Grade 865%

School 65% · District 65%

▲ 28 pts above state median

Social studies

Grade 546%

School 46% · District 46%

▲ 17 pts above state median

Grade 876%

School 76% · District 76%

▲ 33 pts above state median

This schoolGlen Lake Community Schools, same grade

Graduation rate (ACGR) reflects the federally published Adjusted Cohort Graduation Rate for the most recent year available. We refresh this data annually at the close of each academic year in June. The federal source publishes a banded rate (for example, "90-94%") instead of an exact number for cohorts small enough to risk identifying individual students. The state distribution chart, where shown, plots every school in the state with a published rate or band; schools whose rate is federally suppressed are excluded. Where the federal source publishes a band rather than an exact rate, the school is placed within its band using a stable, ID-derived offset, so its position is consistent across visits.

Proficiency by household income

English language arts

Grade 3Lower-income50%Higher-income47%3 pp gap

Grade 4Lower-income42%Higher-income58%16 pp gap

Grade 5Lower-income30%Higher-income77%47 pp gap

Grade 6Lower-income42%Higher-income53%11 pp gap

Grade 7Lower-income40%Higher-income47%7 pp gap

Grade 8Lower-income85%Higher-income88%3 pp gap

Mathematics

Grade 3Lower-income50%Higher-income62%12 pp gap

Grade 4Lower-income25%Higher-income48%23 pp gap

Grade 5Lower-income25%Higher-income40%15 pp gap

Grade 6Lower-income29%Higher-income47%18 pp gap

Grade 7Lower-income45%Higher-income53%8 pp gap

Grade 8Lower-income50%Higher-income55%5 pp gap