Original Research by School Decision on Syracuse High
Syracuse High is a large public high school serving grades ten through twelve in Davis County, part of the Davis District. The school sits in the rapidly growing, predominantly residential suburb of Syracuse, a community that has transformed from an agricultural and salt-production town into a bedroom community for the Ogden-Clearfield metropolitan area. The city’s population has climbed sharply in recent decades, a growth that shows in the school’s enrollment: Syracuse High is a sizable school for an upper-secondary institution, drawing from surrounding neighborhoods that have seen sustained new residential development.
The student body is predominantly white, with a modest Hispanic share and small representations of Asian, Black, Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander, American Indian or Alaska Native, and multiracial students. A notable portion of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, roughly one in seven, which is a moderate share for a suburban Utah high school. Complete counts for students with disabilities and English learners were not reported in the available data.
State testing data was not available for Syracuse High across the subjects and grades assessed, so a direct measure of academic proficiency relative to other schools cannot be given. The comparison set of districts in Davis County also lacks this metric for the school, meaning there is no available positioning on overall proficiency. A parent may want to ask the school or district for its most recent state assessment results to get a clearer picture of academic performance.
The graduation rate is also absent from the provided data, as is the chronic absenteeism rate. These are standard measures for a high school, and their absence is a gap that families should note. Because the school serves only grades ten through twelve, it has a compressed timeline for building student records, but that alone does not explain missing graduation data. It would be reasonable to inquire at the school about its four-year graduation rate and attendance patterns.
The community context matters for understanding what this school offers. Syracuse is a suburban community with low-density development and an auto-oriented layout, though the city has planned a Town Center and has adopted trails and active transportation plans that signal intent to create more walkable nodes. The city has no traditional downtown; schools sit on campuses in residential neighborhoods. Antelope Island State Park, accessible via a causeway from Syracuse, is a major recreational anchor. The area is part of the broader Davis County housing market, where home values and rents are elevated relative to national benchmarks: buying a home is expensive, and renting is comparatively more affordable than the cost of a mortgage, a dynamic common along the Wasatch Front.
The Davis District has made some recent changes that affect Syracuse High. In 2022, the district opened Farmington High School to relieve overcrowding at Davis High and other nearby high schools, which reshaped attendance boundaries and feeder patterns in the region. The district also expanded optional full-day kindergarten to all elementary schools starting in the 2023-24 school year, a statewide policy change that may matter to families with younger children looking ahead.
Without test scores, a graduation rate, or chronic absenteeism data, a clear academic evaluation of Syracuse High is not possible from the evidence at hand. The school’s size, its location in a fast-growing suburb, and its place within a large district are the main known factors. Families should seek out the school’s own reporting on student outcomes to fill in what is missing.
See more original research from School Decision →