Original Research by School Decision on New Market Skills Center
New Market Skills Center is a career and technical school serving a very small number of eleventh and twelfth graders from across the Tumwater School District. It is not a comprehensive high school; it exists specifically to provide hands-on occupational training alongside a student's regular high school coursework. For families, this means a student would typically attend their home high school for core academic classes and come to New Market for career-focused instruction.
The enrolled student body is small. The racial and ethnic composition is predominantly white, with very small numbers of Black, Hispanic, and multiracial students. A modest share of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, which is a common measure of economic need. Because the school serves only the last two years of high school and is entirely career-focused, it does not participate in the standard state testing program used to measure academic proficiency. This is typical for a career and technical center in Washington state. No state test scores are reported, and there is no graduation rate data, a gap that reflects the specialized nature of the program rather than any performance issue. A parent concerned about academic outcomes would need to look to the student's home high school for that picture, as New Market’s purpose is skill development, not general education completion.
The school has no Title I status, no discipline data, no course access records, and no staffing figures in the available information. The lack of these data points is not unusual for a school of this size and type, but a parent considering the school should ask the school or district directly about class sizes in specific trades, instructor credentials, and placement rates after graduation.
New Market Skills Center sits within the Tumwater School District, which serves the city of Tumwater. Tumwater is a mix of state government offices, residential neighborhoods, and commercial corridors along Interstate 5, bordering the state capital Olympia to the north. The city’s economy is anchored by state agencies and a handful of large private employers. The former Olympia Brewery site has been redeveloped into the Tumwater Craft District, a mixed-use space with restaurants, retail, and housing. The district was formed around the Deschutes River falls, and Brewery Park at Tumwater Falls remains the city’s central recreational attraction.
The school district recently saw voters approve a replacement Educational Programs and Operations Levy and a Capital Projects and Technology Levy, both in early 2022 and running through 2026. These levies fund staff, programs, technology, safety, and facility improvements that state funding does not fully cover. For a family considering New Market Skills Center, these levies help sustain the career and technical programming the school offers.
For a student who knows they want to leave high school with direct job training in a specific trade or industry, New Market Skills Center offers exactly that pathway. The school is not a fit for a student seeking a broad academic high school experience, a traditional college preparatory curriculum, or a full slate of extracurricular activities within one building. It is a specialized complement to that experience. A parent should confirm which career programs are active in the current school year, how transportation works between the home high school and the Skills Center, and whether the program counts toward the home school’s graduation requirements. The school fills a narrow but important niche within the Tumwater School District, and its value depends entirely on whether a student’s goals align with its focused mission.
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