The top reported proficiency rate is 25% in English language arts. The lowest is 11% in Math.
Original Research by School Decision on Lawrence Jrsr High School
Lawrence JrSr High School sits at the center of a small, close-knit village in Van Buren County, between Kalamazoo and Lake Michigan. The village of Lawrence has a compact downtown along Paw Paw Street, where the village hall, township hall, and library branch cluster within a few blocks. Community life revolves around family-oriented events like Music in the Park, the Labor Day Ox Roast Homecoming Festival, Christmas in the Park, and a Farmers Market. It is a rural, auto-dependent place with modest residential streets and a commercial presence limited mainly to its main corridor. Growth has been slow, and what investment exists appears focused on existing housing stock through rehabilitation programs and a community fundraising effort for a new inclusive playground rather than large-scale development.
The school serves grades seven through twelve and is part of Lawrence Public Schools. Its enrollment is small for a combined junior-senior high, which means students across a six-year span share a single building. The student body is roughly split between white and Hispanic students, with a small handful of students from other racial backgrounds. A substantial majority of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch. The village itself has a notably high diversity index for the region, and that is reflected in the school's composition. We looked for data on English learners and students with individualized education programs but found none reported, so those populations cannot be characterized here.
State testing data is available only for seventh and eighth grade, since Michigan assesses those grades through M-STEP and PSAT. The results are weak across every tested subject and grade. Math proficiency is low in both seventh and eighth grade. English language arts is stronger in eighth grade than seventh, where it reaches a moderate level, but the seventh-grade result remains low. Science and social studies proficiency in eighth grade are also low. Taken together, the school's overall proficiency lands in the bottom quartile relative to districts in Van Buren County. A parent may want to look into this further with the school, particularly what academic supports and interventions are in place for students below proficiency.
No trend data is available for comparison across years, and participation rates were not reported, which limits what can be said about whether these results represent a pattern or a single-year snapshot. The cut scores for social studies did change this year, which the state flags as affecting comparability, though that applies only to one subject.
We searched for a graduation rate for the school but found none reported in the available data. This may reflect how the state attributes graduation to the district level or how small-school reporting works, but the data does not specify a reason. Chronic absenteeism data was also missing. Without these outcomes, it is hard to assess the full picture for older students, particularly whether the low middle-grade proficiency carries through to graduation. Course access, staffing, discipline, and attendance data were all absent as well, so nothing can be said about advanced coursework offerings, counselor ratios, or disciplinary patterns.
The housing market in the Lawrence area is relatively affordable compared with state and national benchmarks. Home values sit below the Michigan median and well below the national figure, and values have dipped slightly over the past year rather than rising. Mortgage costs are shaped by current rates in the mid-six-percent range. No rent data was available. The price-to-income ratio suggests that buying a home here is within reach for many working families relative to national norms, though incomes in the village itself are modest. The village is predominantly owner-occupied, and the community's civic energy is channeled into events, library programming, parks and recreation, and volunteer emergency services rather than economic expansion.
We searched for recent district-level changes such as curriculum updates, bond measures, or pedagogy shifts but found nothing that clears a lasting-impact threshold. The district brief came back empty on parent-relevant changes.
What this means for families is that Lawrence JrSr High offers a small, combined-grade environment in a rural community with strong civic identity and affordable housing. The academic data that is available points to real challenges in middle-grade proficiency, and the absence of graduation, attendance, and course-access data leaves gaps a family would want to fill by talking directly with the school. The peer environment is diverse for the region, and the school's small size means students are known individually, but the academic pathway through high school cannot be fully assessed from the data on hand.
See more original research from School Decision →