Original Research by School Decision on Wittenberg-birnamwood High
Wittenberg-Birnamwood High is a small public high school serving grades nine through twelve in the village of Wittenberg, located in rural Shawano County, Wisconsin. The school is part of the Wittenberg-Birnamwood School District and sits within the village footprint on West Grand Avenue, near other civic and commercial buildings rather than on a remote campus. The school enrolls a modest number of students across each grade, yielding a total high school population that is small enough that most students and staff would know one another.
The student body is predominantly white, with a sizeable Hispanic presence and smaller shares of American Indian students and students who identify as two or more races. Just over two out of five students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, a rate that signals a mixed economic terrain where a substantial share of families rely on the program. The district did not report data on students with individualized education plans or English learners at this school, so a parent with a child in either category would want to ask the school directly about available supports.
Wittenberg itself is a small village whose character is shaped by a diversified industrial base that includes wood and paper products, textiles, iron works, food processing, and agriculture. Notable local employers include Nueske’s Applewood Smoked Meats, Homme Home for the Aging, and Ho-Chunk Gaming Wittenberg. The village has invested in a business park east of town, and a mural project called the Walls of Wittenberg turns downtown into an open-air gallery. The population has seen a slight decline in recent years, but the village markets itself as an affordable place to live with a cost of living below state and national averages. Housing values in the broader area reflect that relative affordability, and the local property tax mill rate has been declining in recent years, which eases the burden on homeowners even as the district has sought additional operational funding through referendums.
The district's financial picture is directly relevant to families considering the high school. In November 2024, voters approved a recurring revenue referendum by a very narrow margin — just sixteen votes — allowing the district to exceed the state revenue limit for several years to fund programming, operations, and facility maintenance. This followed a three-year referendum passed in 2021. The closeness of the 2024 vote suggests a community that is closely divided on school spending, but the measure's passage nonetheless provides the district with additional resources it had been relying on. At the same time, the mill rate has continued to drop, meaning the tax rate for homeowners has gone down even as the district has gained permission to raise more revenue through the levy. The interplay of these trends is something a parent may want to understand by reviewing district budget materials or attending a school board meeting.
What is most notable about this school, and what a family will need to investigate directly, is the absence of the academic performance data that typically helps families compare high schools. State assessment results were not available in the data reviewed, and the school's graduation rate was also not reported. This means there is no public record of how students at Wittenberg-Birnamwood High perform on state tests or how many complete high school in four years relative to other Shawano County districts. Such gaps can occur for a variety of reasons, including data collection lags or changes in state testing, but the upshot for a parent is that the usual academic benchmarks are not here to consult. Without test scores or a graduation rate, it is harder to gauge academic rigor or student outcomes from the outside. A family considering this school would want to request those figures directly from the school or district office, ask about curriculum and course pathways, and talk to current students and families about their experiences.
The school's program offerings were also not listed in the data, so there is no public accounting of Advanced Placement courses, dual credit opportunities, career and technical education tracks, or extracurriculars. The district's recent referendums cite programming and operations as intended uses of the additional revenue, which suggests the district sees a need to invest in those areas. Given the small size of the high school, the range of elective and advanced courses may be narrower than at a larger school, though that is not certain from the available information.
In sum, Wittenberg-Birnamwood High serves a small, rural community with a mixed economic base and a history of narrow but successful school funding referendums. The student population is modest in size and economically diverse, and the village offers an affordable cost of living. The school's academic performance data is absent, leaving a significant gap for any parent trying to evaluate its academic standing. A family interested in this school will need to conduct their own research, including direct conversations with school staff, to fill in what publicly reported data does not provide.
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