The top reported proficiency rate is 32% in Math. The lowest is 21% in Science.
Original Research by School Decision on Leland School Park
Leland School Park sits on Milam Street in Leland, a small Mississippi Delta town on Deer Creek in Washington County. The school is part of the Leland School District, which operates three schools for the city: this campus as the sole middle school, Leland High School, and Edna M. Scott Elementary. Leland itself is a quiet agricultural town. Farming has anchored the local economy since before the Civil War, with cotton, soybeans, rice, corn, and catfish as leading crops. Mississippi State University and the USDA run a research station at Stoneville on the town's outskirts, and numerous private agribusiness firms operate in the surrounding area. The town carries a strong blues heritage, with five Mississippi Blues Trail markers and a downtown blues museum, plus the Jim Henson Exhibit honoring the Muppets creator's childhood home. Highway 61 runs through Leland, connecting it to the wider Delta region. The population has been declining, and no major new housing developments or commercial expansion projects surfaced in publicly reported search results. The city's official website references a vision of inclusive growth and investment in youth, but the texture remains small-town rather than bustling.
The school serves grades six through eight, though the enrollment data also includes pre-kindergarten and kindergarten counts, which suggests the campus may share space or operations with younger grades in some capacity. The data does not clarify this arrangement, so a parent may want to ask the district directly. Total enrollment is modest for a middle school. Every student qualifies for free or reduced-price lunch, which means the entire student body meets the federal income threshold for that program. The student population is predominantly Black, with small numbers of Hispanic, white, and multiracial students.
On the most recent Mississippi Academic Assessment Program results from the current school year, proficiency varies by grade and subject but sits low across the board. In math, seventh grade posted the strongest result, with roughly two-fifths of tested students scoring proficient or above. Sixth and eighth grade math proficiency were lower, each around a quarter to a third. English language arts showed a similar spread: sixth grade reached just under two-fifths proficient, seventh grade dropped to just over a quarter, and eighth grade fell below a fifth. Eighth-grade science proficiency was also low, at roughly a fifth of tested students. Participation rates were not reported, so it is unclear whether all eligible students sat for the exams. No multi-year trend data was available, so there is no way to tell from the provided data whether these results represent improvement, decline, or stability over time.
A parent reading these numbers should understand them in context. The school serves a community where every student qualifies for free or reduced-price lunch, and the town has been losing population. Both factors correlate with the kinds of academic challenges the proficiency results reflect. The results are a factual soft spot. A parent may want to look into what interventions, tutoring, or extended-learning programs the school and district offer, since the provided data did not include any program offerings, course access details, or staffing information.
Several other data points that would help a parent evaluate this school were missing. Special-population rates for students with individualized education programs and English learners were not reported. Discipline data, civil-rights information, staffing levels, and attendance figures were all absent. No neighbor comparison or positioning set was available to place Leland School Park against other middle schools in Washington County or the state. The district brief turned up little of lasting parent-relevant change beyond routine profile data and staff awards.
The housing market around the school is very affordable by any standard. Home values in the school's zip code sit far below both the Mississippi state benchmark and the national benchmark, and they have declined further over the past year. Estimated monthly mortgage costs are low. Rental data was not available. For a family already rooted in the Delta or drawn to the area's agricultural economy and cultural heritage, housing costs would not be a barrier. The trade-off is that the local economy is narrow, dominated by agribusiness with limited healthcare and retail options, and the town has been contracting rather than growing.
Leland School Park is a small, community-embedded middle school in a declining Delta town with an agriculture-dependent economy and deeply affordable housing. Its academic results are low across subjects and grades. The data gaps are wide enough that a parent considering this school should go directly to the district for details on programs, staffing, support services, and any plans for improvement.
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