Alexander Batcho Intermediate School, Manville NJ

Original Research by School Decision on Alexander Batcho Intermediate School

Alexander Batcho Intermediate School serves students in grades five through eight in Manville, a compact borough in Somerset County with a working-class, Polish American heritage and a history centered on the Johns-Manville asbestos plant. The school is one of four in the Manville School District and sits within a dense, grid-like neighborhood that reflects the borough’s early-20th-century company-town layout.

The student body is close to five hundred, with just over six in ten qualifying for free or reduced-price lunch, a substantial share that signals a community with moderate household incomes. Hispanic students make up the largest group, followed by a sizeable White minority and smaller shares of Black, Asian, and multiracial students. The school does not report its count of English learners or students with disabilities in the available data, so families who need information about those supports should follow up directly.

On New Jersey’s state assessments, performance is low. In mathematics, the share of students scoring proficient or above was in the low teens for fifth, sixth, and seventh grades, and for eighth graders no student in the tested group met the standard. English language arts results were somewhat higher: about a quarter of fifth graders were proficient, rising to roughly one-third of sixth graders, and just over two-fifths of seventh and eighth graders met the bar, though still far below state averages. Science proficiency was very thin, with roughly one in ten students scoring at the proficient level in both tested grades.

When placed against other districts in Somerset County, Alexander Batcho Intermediate’s overall proficiency index sits in the lowest quarter of the county, a gap a parent considering the school would want to weigh against the community’s broader context.

The borough of Manville has seen near-flat population change in recent years. Housing in the area, while notably less expensive than in wealthier parts of Somerset County, still carries costs that account for a sizable share of local median income. The rental market is similarly tight. For families already rooted in Manville, Alexander Batcho is the neighborhood intermediate school, and the district’s four-school structure keeps class sizes compact and students in a familiar setting through eighth grade. No recent district-level changes, such as budget referendums or curriculum shifts, were publicly reported, so the school’s current programming appears to be largely steady.

The available data did not include information on course offerings, enrichment programs, or school climate metrics like discipline rates and chronic absenteeism. Families may want to request those details from the school to get a fuller picture of day-to-day student life.

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Academic performance

How students perform on state tests, by grade, set against the district.

Math

Grade 512%

School 12% · District 12%

▼ 31 pts below state median · ▼ 46 pts below county median

Grade 614%

School 14% · District 14%

▼ 19 pts below state median · ▼ 36 pts below county median

Grade 717%

School 17% · District 17%

▼ 18 pts below state median · ▼ 30 pts below county median

Grade 80%

School 0% · District 0%

▼ 17 pts below state median · ▼ 31 pts below county median

English language arts

Grade 524%

School 24% · District 24%

▼ 30 pts below state median · ▼ 42 pts below county median

Grade 633%

School 33% · District 33%

▼ 21 pts below state median · ▼ 34 pts below county median

Grade 741%

School 41% · District 41%

▼ 16 pts below state median · ▼ 28 pts below county median

Grade 844%

School 44% · District 44%

▼ 13 pts below state median · ▼ 27 pts below county median

Science

Grade 510%

School 10% · District 10%

▼ 17 pts below state median · ▼ 32 pts below county median

Grade 88%

School 8% · District 8%

▼ 5 pts below state median · ▼ 23 pts below county median

This schoolManville School District, 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 5Lower-income17%Higher-income40%23 pp gap

Grade 6Lower-income25%Higher-income50%25 pp gap

Grade 7Lower-income27%Higher-income63%35 pp gap

Grade 8Lower-income35%Higher-income63%28 pp gap

Mathematics

Grade 5Lower-income9%Higher-income19%10 pp gap

Grade 6Lower-income12%Higher-income18%6 pp gap

Grade 7Lower-income12%Higher-income26%14 pp gap

Grade 8Lower-income0%Higher-income0%0 pp gap