The top reported proficiency rate is 57% in Social studies. The lowest is 46% in Science.
Original Research by School Decision on Shawano Community Middle
Shawano Community Middle sits within the Shawano School District and serves grades six through eight as a regular public school. The school is located on the south side of Shawano, a small city that serves as the county seat of Shawano County in northeastern Wisconsin, roughly 40 miles west of Green Bay. Shawano blends residential neighborhoods with a reemerging downtown along Main Street and Sawyer Street, where City Hall, the library, and the post office are clustered, while the middle school and other district buildings sit on their own campuses away from the central core. The Wolf River runs through the city and Shawano Lake lies at the edge of the city limits, giving the community a recreational and waterfront dimension. The population has seen modest growth in recent years, and the city describes itself as thriving with a reemerging downtown.
Enrollment is moderate for a middle school serving three grades, and the student body is notably diverse for the region. A little more than half the students are White, while roughly one in five students is American Indian or Alaska Native, reflecting the city’s proximity to the Menominee Nation to the north. Students who identify as two or more races make up the next largest group, followed by smaller shares of Hispanic, Black, Asian, and Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander students. More than half of the students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, indicating that a substantial share of families face economic challenges. Data on the share of students with individualized education programs or English learner status was not available.
State testing results from the Wisconsin Forward assessment show a mixed academic picture. In math, proficiency rates declined slightly from sixth to eighth grade, with roughly half of sixth graders and a slightly lower share of eighth graders meeting the state’s proficiency benchmark. In English language arts, seventh graders performed the strongest among the three grade levels, with a little more than half scoring proficient or above, while eighth graders showed the weakest results, with fewer than half reaching that level. On the eighth-grade science assessment, fewer than half of students scored proficient. Social studies, tested only in eighth grade, was the relative bright spot, where a majority of students met the proficiency bar. When compared to other districts across Shawano County, the school’s overall proficiency across all tested subjects and grades sits above the midpoint among the six districts in the county, which suggests that within the local context, academic performance is in the middle to upper range relative to neighboring districts.
Because the school serves only grades six through eight, there is no graduation rate to report, which is typical for a middle school. The school does not serve high school grades, so measures like college readiness, Advanced Placement participation, or career and technical education pathways do not apply here.
The peer environment at Shawano Community Middle reflects the broader community’s demographic composition, including a significant Native American presence that is relatively uncommon in many Wisconsin schools. For families considering the school, the economic diversity of the student body and the mix of racial and ethnic backgrounds may be relevant considerations. The school’s academic results are somewhat uneven, with some grades and subjects showing a majority of students meeting state standards while others fall short of that mark. A parent may want to look into this further with the school to understand how the school supports students who are not yet proficient and whether interventions vary by grade level or subject.
The Shawano School District itself showed little in the way of recently reported major changes, so the narrative here rests on what the school and community data reveal about the current environment. For a family weighing this school, the picture is one of a mid-sized middle school in a small Wisconsin county seat, with academically mixed test results that are slightly above the average for surrounding districts, and a student body shaped by the region’s economic and racial diversity.
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