The top reported proficiency rate is 49% in Science. The lowest is 37% in Math.
Original Research by School Decision on Perry Co. Middle
Perry Co. Middle serves grades six through eight in the Perryville public schools, drawing students from the surrounding portion of Perry County. It is a regular public school, not a charter or magnet, with a modest-sized enrollment for a middle school. The student body is predominantly white, with a smaller Hispanic presence, and in line with the local working and middle-class economic mix, a substantial share of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch. No data was reported for the share of students with an Individualized Education Program or English learner status, so the school’s special-education and language-support caseloads are not available to describe.
On the Missouri Assessment Program, Perry Co. Middle shows a varied pattern across subjects and grades. In English language arts, proficiency is reported at a moderate level across all three grades, with the highest share of students meeting the state’s Proficient or Above benchmark in seventh grade. The eighth-grade science results sit in a similar range. Math scores are more uneven: seventh-grade math posts the strongest performance at the school, and sixth-grade math lands slightly lower, but the eighth-grade math results drop off noticeably. A parent may want to speak with the school about how it supports math learning in the final middle school year, particularly given the gap between that grade and the other two. The school’s overall proficiency standing relative to other middle schools in Perry County could not be compared because the county contains too few school-level observations to produce a reliable neighbor comparison; no wider benchmarking against the state was available in the data provided.
The school sits in Perryville, the county seat, a small city that grew as a commercial hub for the farmland and small towns around it. The economy is a mix of manufacturing and food processing, with two large employers in those sectors, plus healthcare provided by a local hospital. Housing values in the area fall below both the Missouri and national medians, a characteristic that often reflects the area’s small-city and rural context. The community holds festivals on the courthouse square and at a seminary fairground, and the completion of the I-55 corridor and a highway bypass have shaped recent commercial growth along the interstate interchange. The district itself—Perry Co. 32—did not surface any recent notable changes or strategic initiatives in the search conducted.
A family moving into the Perryville area and enrolling a child in this school will find an environment that is mostly middle school–sized, with academic results that are mixed by grade and subject. The English and science numbers are moderate, seventh-grade math is a relative bright spot, and the eighth-grade math performance is a softer point worth investigating. There is no high school graduation rate to consider here, since the school ends at grade eight. The community is a traditional small county seat with stable industry and housing that is more affordable than wider state and national averages. No data on discipline, chronic absenteeism, course access, or staffing was present in the information provided, so a parent may want to ask the school directly about those dimensions of daily life.
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