The reported proficiency rate for Math is 16%.
Original Research by School Decision on La Plata High
La Plata High School serves grades seven through twelve in the small north-central Missouri town of La Plata, a community whose identity is tied to its railroad heritage and agricultural surroundings. The town has experienced a population decline in recent decades, and the school sits within the La Plata R-II district, which operates one elementary school and this combined middle and high school. The school’s student body is small and overwhelmingly white, with a modest share of students qualifying for free or reduced-price lunch. The school is a regular public school with no charter or magnet status.
State testing data for La Plata High is limited. In eighth-grade math, the proportion of students scoring proficient or above was well below the midpoint relative to other districts in Macon County, placing the school in the bottom quartile for overall proficiency across tested subjects and grades. Results for seventh-grade math and for English language arts and science at both tested grade levels were suppressed, meaning the state did not release them, likely due to small group sizes. A parent should be aware that what is available points to low math proficiency, and the suppressed results in other subjects make it difficult to get a full picture of academic performance. No high school end-of-course exam data appears in the record for this school, so performance in upper-level subjects is not measured here.
No graduation rate was available, so the school’s success in moving students from enrollment to diploma cannot be assessed from the data provided. Similarly, information on chronic absenteeism, course access, staffing, and discipline is absent, leaving gaps in understanding the school’s learning environment and student engagement.
The community around the school is a rural town with a compact downtown, a historic square district, and an active Amtrak station. Housing values are lower than the state average, and the area is not experiencing growth; the population has been shrinking. The district itself reported no recent major changes such as referendums, curriculum shifts, or property tax adjustments in publicly available sources, so the school’s academic programming and district operations have likely been stable in the near term.
For a family considering La Plata High, the school offers a small, close-knit setting where students know each other and staff. The academic picture, however, contains significant uncertainty. The one clear data point shows a need for improvement in middle school math, and the lack of visible results in other tested areas means there is little evidence to judge overall student achievement. A parent would want to ask the school directly about its curriculum, advanced coursework, career and technical education opportunities, and how it supports students who are behind. The absence of a graduation rate is another open question worth raising with the administration. This school may fit a family that values a small rural environment and is prepared to engage actively with the staff to understand how the academic program serves its students.
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