The top reported proficiency rate is 47% in English language arts. The lowest is 35% in Science.
Original Research by School Decision on North Country Union Junior High School
North Country Union Junior High School sits on Junior High Drive in Derby, Vermont, serving seventh and eighth graders from the surrounding North Country community. It is a public, non-charter school operating within the North Country Union Junior High School District, overseen by the broader North Country Supervisory Union based in nearby Newport. The school draws from Derby and the wider Orleans County area, a rural stretch of villages, lakes, and rolling hills in Vermont's Northeast Kingdom.
Derby itself is the most populous community in Orleans County, but that label carries a rural reality. The town spreads across six villages, including Derby Center, Derby Line, Beebe Plain, and North Derby, separated by distances of farmland, ponds, and Class 3 dirt roads. There is no single walkable core. Commercial life clusters along the Newport-Derby Road, also known as US Route 5, where large retailers and restaurants have overflowed from neighboring Newport. Interstate 91 terminates its run through Derby with its final three interchanges. The Haskell Free Library and Opera House, a bi-national landmark straddling the US-Canada border in Derby Line, stands as a cultural anchor, and Indoor Recreation of Orleans County provides a regional sports and aquatic facility. Public transit is limited to a fare-free bus with a few runs each weekday connecting Derby Center to Newport. For families, this means a setting where a car is essential and where civic, commercial, and school functions occupy separate campuses rather than a central downtown.
The junior high serves a modest enrollment for its two grade levels. A substantial share of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, reflecting the economic conditions of the region. The student body is overwhelmingly white, with small numbers of students identifying as Hispanic, multiracial, Black, or American Indian and Alaska Native. Data on individualized education programs and English learner status was not available, so those populations cannot be characterized here. Housing in the area is relatively affordable compared with state and national benchmarks, with typical home values sitting below both Vermont and national medians. Rental data was not available.
On Vermont's Comprehensive Assessment Program, the most recent results show a mixed academic picture. English language arts is the relative strength. Eighth graders reached proficiency at a rate just above half, and seventh graders landed somewhat below that mark but still ahead of their math results. Math proficiency was lower in both grades, with seventh graders ahead of eighth graders but both well short of half. Eighth grade science results landed at about a third proficient. These are not standout numbers for the state, and a parent may want to look into this further with the school, particularly in mathematics, where results are the softest. No multi-year trend data was available, so it is not possible to say whether performance is improving, declining, or holding steady.
The school's grade span means it has no graduation rate, no AP or dual-credit course catalog, and no high school pathway data. Those measures do not apply to a seventh and eighth grade school. Program offerings, staffing ratios, discipline data, attendance and chronic absenteeism figures, and Title I status were not provided in the available data, so those dimensions cannot be assessed here. We looked for recent district-level changes or strategic priorities and found little of lasting impact on record.
Among districts in Orleans County, proficiency index comparisons could not be computed because the cohort was too small, and graduation and attendance comparisons do not apply to this grade band. So the school's standing against its neighbors cannot be rendered from the available numbers. What the data does show is a small, rural junior high serving a working-population community in a scenic but dispersed corner of Vermont, with English language arts results that hold their own and mathematics results that leave room for growth. Families considering this school will want to ask directly about supports in math, enrichment opportunities, and the transition path into North Country Union High School, which sits on a separate campus and serves the area's older students.
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