The top reported proficiency rate is 49% in English language arts. The lowest is 20% in Science.
Original Research by School Decision on Huntington Middle School
Huntington Middle School sits in the heart of a river city that has spent decades redefining itself. The school serves grades six through eight and operates as a regular public school within Cabell County Schools, the district that covers Huntington and the surrounding county. Its location on 3rd Street places it within the urban core of a community shaped by its railroad origins, its relationship with Marshall University, and the lingering footprint of the Port of Huntington Tri-State, one of the busiest inland ports in the country.
The school enrolls a student body that reflects Huntington itself. White students make up the largest share, with a substantial Black population and a meaningful multiracial presence. Smaller numbers of Hispanic and Asian students round out the demographics. The data available does not include free-or-reduced-price lunch counts, special education rates, or English learner figures, so a parent wanting to understand the socioeconomic profile or the level of specialized support would need to ask the school directly.
Academically, the most recent state assessment results tell a mixed story. In English language arts, Huntington Middle performs respectably across all three grades. Roughly half of sixth and eighth graders reached proficiency, with seventh grade landing just below that mark. These are solid numbers for a middle school in a district serving a city with Huntington's economic history. Reading and writing instruction appears to be an area of relative strength.
Mathematics is a softer area. Proficiency drops as students move through the grades, with sixth and seventh grade landing around the lower third of students meeting the bar and eighth grade falling further. Science results for eighth grade, the only middle grade tested, show an even smaller share of students reaching proficiency. Participation rates are strong across every subject and grade, which means the results reflect nearly the entire student body rather than a skewed subset. A parent whose child struggles with math, or whose child excels and needs acceleration, may want to look into what the school offers for intervention and enrichment beyond the standard curriculum.
No program offerings, course access, staffing, discipline, or attendance data were available in the materials provided. The district brief for Cabell County Schools surfaced no recent referendums, curriculum overhauls, or other parent-relevant changes. This is not unusual for a district of this size in a given reporting cycle, but it does mean the picture here is limited to assessment outcomes and community context.
Huntington as a place carries a particular character. Founded as a planned rail town, it grew into an industrial powerhouse and then lost much of that base after the mid-twentieth century. The city has been working on revitalization, with a downtown anchored by Pullman Square, Heritage Station, and a walkable commercial core near Marshall University's campus. Ritter Park, nationally recognized as a great public space, sits in the hills above downtown and gives families a substantial green amenity. The broader Huntington-Ashland metropolitan area provides a regional market that extends across state lines into Kentucky and Ohio.
Housing in the school's zip code is affordable by any standard. Home values sit well below the state benchmark and far below national figures, and rents are modest. The price-to-income ratio suggests that families with steady employment can manage homeownership here more easily than in most of the country. At the same time, the city has experienced long-term population decline, and formal housing needs assessments and revitalization plans indicate local leaders are actively working to reverse that trend. A family choosing Huntington Middle School is choosing a community in transition, with genuine civic assets and real economic challenges coexisting in the same few square miles.
For a parent weighing this school, the academic signal is clear: ELA outcomes are a relative strength, math and science need attention, and the school's urban setting in a historically working-class city means the peer environment and community context differ from suburban alternatives. The missing data on programs, support services, and school climate means a visit and direct questions to the administration would fill in what the numbers cannot.
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