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What's one thing Columbia Middle School gets right about preparing students for what comes next?
Community prompt from u/allk12. Replies below.
Enrollment
636
Middle
DISTRICT 653 · STATE 462
SCHOOL COMMUNITY·AURORA PUBLIC SCHOOLS·NCES 080234001322
Columbia Middle School
17600 EAST COLUMBIA AVE, AURORA, CO 80013 · (303) 690-6570 · Arapahoe County
GRADES 06–08MIDDLE11-CITYTITLE IREGULAR SCHOOL636 STUDENTS
C
allk12 Grade
Scored higher than 27% of Colorado public middle schools
- C-Test scores Share of students meeting the state standard in reading, math, and other tested subjects, 2023-24 and 2024-25.
- B-Beats expectations How far test scores land above or below what the share of low-income students predicts for a school in this state.
- ·Three-year trend Not available for this school, so the grade uses the other parts.
Grades compare a school only with schools in the same state, because every state gives its own test. How grades work · Top-graded Colorado public middle schools
Student : Teacher
17.7:1
36 FTE teachers
DISTRICT 19.0:1 · STATE 15.9:1
Free / Reduced Lunch
76%
481 students
DISTRICT 81% · STATE 50%
Community
6
0 members
Enrollment and student:teacher ratio compared against other middle schools. Free/Reduced Lunch and demographics compared against all schools.
Enrollment by grade, 2024-25
| Grade | Students | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Grade 6 | 222 | 35% |
| Grade 7 | 208 | 33% |
| Grade 8 | 206 | 32% |
Student demographics
68%Diversity index
The chance that two students picked at random belong to different racial or ethnic groups.
DISTRICT 60% · STATE 62% · US 70%
Student head counts by race/ethnicity from federal NCES enrollment data. District, state, and US figures are each group's share of all public school students in that area (US excludes territories). Very small groups may be suppressed in the source, so categories do not always sum exactly to total enrollment.
Gender split
Test scores
CMAS 2024-25 . % Met or Exceeded ExpectationsEnglish Language Arts
25.0%
CO avg 44.9% . -0.5pp since 2023
Math
18.2%
CO avg 36.1% . +4.6pp since 2023
What this means: On the CMAS, Colorado's statewide test, about 25 of every 100 students at this school read and write at grade level and about 18 of 100 do math at grade level. Across all Colorado schools, those numbers are about 45 and 36. Reading and writing scores have held steady since 2023, while math scores are up about 5 points.
CMAS results by year
| School year | English Language Arts | Math |
|---|---|---|
| 2024-25 | 25.0% | 18.2% |
| 2023-24 | 25.5% | 13.6% |
% Met or Exceeded Expectations, all students and all tested grades.
Source: CMAS. All students, all grades. See all years and grades →
BeatsExpectations
Demographically-adjusted score · methodologyTier
AS EXPECTED
Performing as predicted given the school's student profile
Actual proficiency
19.2%
composite math + reading, all grades
Predicted
20.9%
based on CO schools with similar FRL share
Beats by
-1.6pp
below demographic expectation
What this means: About 19% of students here test proficient in math and reading, compared with the roughly 21% typical for Colorado schools with a similar share of low-income students. BeatsExpectations measures results against demographically similar schools rather than by raw scores, and this school falls within the typical range, neither among Colorado's top nor bottom 10%.
BeatsExpectations runs a per-state regression of proficiency on free/reduced-lunch share, then scores each school by residual. How this is calculated →
Schools most like Columbia Middle School
Columbia Middle School's state test result (19.2% proficient) is higher than 3 of the 5 schools below with a result.
| School | Students | Low-income | Proficient |
|---|---|---|---|
| Columbia Middle School this school | 636 | 75.6% | 19.2% |
| Mrachek Middle School AURORA | 811 | 82.7% | 11.3% |
| Hamilton Middle School DENVER | 775 | 67.4% | 18.9% |
| DSST: Conservatory Green Middle School DENVER | 468 | 68.8% | 25.3% |
| Aurora Hills Middle School AURORA | 821 | 85.9% | 8.7% |
| Fox Meadow Middle School COLORADO SPRINGS | 369 | 81.6% | 21.0% |
Matched among Colorado middle schools on enrollment, the share of students from low-income families (eligible for free or reduced-price lunch), and racial and ethnic makeup. Proficient is the average share of students meeting the state standard across all of the school's state tests in 2023-24 and 2024-25, the same combined score our test-score rankings use. Online schools and schools serving specialized populations are not matched.
Where Columbia Middle School ranks
Among middle schools| Measure | This school | In Colorado | In Arapahoe County |
|---|---|---|---|
| State test proficiency ranked highest first | 19.2% | #192 of 241 | #16 of 22 |
| Math proficiency ranked highest first | 18.2% | #166 of 244 ▲ 22 | #16 of 23 no change |
| Reading proficiency ranked highest first | 25.0% | #202 of 246 ▼ 7 | #18 of 23 ▼ 1 |
| Enrollment ranked largest first | 636 | #71 of 278 | #15 of 24 |
| Students per teacher ranked fewest first | 17.7:1 | #172 of 227 | #17 of 21 |
| Diversity index ranked most diverse first | 68.4% | #16 of 227 | #7 of 21 |
| Free and reduced lunch ranked highest share first | 75.6% | #48 of 246 | #5 of 23 |
| Enrollment change since 2017-18 ranked steepest decline first | -15.3% | #92 of 169 | #14 of 18 |
Ranked against other public middle schools. Online schools are left out of every list, and test-score lists leave out schools that serve specialized populations. Each rank links to the full list. Arrows under a test-score rank show places moved since the prior test year, among schools tested both years.
4-year change
SY 2020-21 vs SY 2024-25Enrollment
636
-87 (-12%) vs 2020
-28% since 1990-91, when it was 887
Student : Teacher
17.7:1
was 18.5:1
Source: NCES Common Core of Data
Enrollment and staffing by year
| School year | Students | Teachers (FTE) | Students per teacher | Free and reduced lunch |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2024-25 | 636 | 36 | 17.7:1 | 76% (481) |
| 2023-24 | 653 | 40 | 16.3:1 | 77% (505) |
| 2022-23 | 679 | 38 | 17.9:1 | 69% (468) |
| 2020-21 | 723 | 39 | 18.5:1 | 65% (472) |
| 2017-18 | 751 | 38.1 | 19.7:1 | 58% (436) |
| 2015-16 | 828 | 41 | 20.2:1 | 59% (487) |
| 2010-11 | 785 | 38 | 20.7:1 | 54% (424) |
| 2000-01 | 950 | 45 | 21.1:1 | 14% (131) |
| 1990-91 | 887 | 49 | 18.1:1 | N/A |
Source: NCES Common Core of Data. Rows are the federal collections on file for Columbia Middle School.
Since 2017-18: students down 15% (751 to 636); teachers down 5% (38.1 to 36).
About Columbia Middle School
The public middle-grades school Columbia Middle School is located in AURORA, Colorado. It teaches 636 students in grades 6 through 8. By comparison, middle schools in Colorado enroll about 462 students on average.
Aurora Public Schools (59 schools, 39,464 students) runs Columbia Middle School.
The largest group at Columbia Middle School is Hispanic students, at 48%. The school is also 23% White, 17% Black, 7% multiracial, and 4% Asian. That is higher than the 22% Hispanic share among all Arapahoe County residents. Measured by the diversity index, the student body scores 68%.
The school has 36 full-time-equivalent teachers and a ratio of 17.7 students per teacher. Statewide, middle schools in Colorado average 15.9:1. Of all students at Columbia Middle School, 76% are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch. By comparison, the figure for public schools in Arapahoe County is 50%.
Columbia Middle School earns a C on the allk12 Grade, which blends test scores, results against poverty-based expectations, and the three-year trend. It scored higher than 27% of Colorado public middle schools.
The model predicts 20.9% for a school in Colorado with Columbia Middle School's free or reduced-price lunch share. Columbia Middle School posts 19.2%.
Five-year Census Bureau estimates for Arapahoe County show that median household income comes to about $101,087, a bachelor's degree or higher is held by about 47% of adults, and the share of residents below the poverty line is 6%. Arapahoe County counts 176 public schools with about 115,502 students.
Dalton Elementary School is about 0.1 miles away, making it the nearest public school. Other public schools within five miles number at least 8. The average proficiency across nearby scored schools is 23.2%; Columbia Middle School's is 19.2%, ranking 7th of 8.
The National Center for Education Statistics classifies the school's location as City: Large, meaning it is inside a principal city with a population of 250,000 or more.
By 2024-25, enrollment had dropped to 636, from 723 in 2020-21.
Parents, students, and staff can share information on pickup and drop-off, after-school programs, and teacher feedback here. Members of the school community can share what they know.
Arapahoe County at a glance
View full county profilePopulation
659,844
Census ACS
Median income
$101,087
Household, ACS
Bachelor's+
47%
Adults 25+
Poverty rate
6%
Below federal line
Schools in county
176
115,502 students
Quick facts
Related schools
Other schools in Aurora Public Schools
- Aurora Central CampusCombined · 2,468 students
- Rangeview High SchoolHigh · 2,078 students
- Vista Peak 9-12 PreparatoryHigh · 2,045 students
- Gateway High SchoolHigh · 1,748 students
- Hinkley High SchoolHigh · 1,527 students
- Lotus School for ExcellenceCombined · 1,008 students
Other schools in AURORA
- Cherokee Trail High SchoolHigh · 3,089 students
- Grandview High SchoolHigh · 2,684 students
- Aurora Central CampusCombined · 2,468 students
- Smoky Hill High SchoolHigh · 2,297 students
- Overland High SchoolHigh · 2,228 students
- Rangeview High SchoolHigh · 2,078 students
Other Columbia Middle schools
10 other US public schools in 8 states are named Columbia Middle. Columbia Middle School is the 5th largest of the 11.
- Columbia Middle SchoolGrovetown, GA · 903 students
- Columbia Middle SchoolMOSES LAKE, WA · 875 students
- Columbia MiddleAdelanto, CA · 754 students
- Columbia MiddleSunnyvale, CA · 697 students
- Columbia Middle SchoolColumbia, IL · 612 students
Nearby schools
- Dalton Elementary School0.1 mi · 430
- Meadowood Child Development Center0.7 mi · 166
- Cimarron Elementary School0.7 mi · 393
- Vassar Elementary School0.7 mi · 500
- Dartmouth Elementary School0.9 mi · 422
- Arrowhead Elementary School0.9 mi · 499
Frequently asked questions
About Columbia Middle SchoolHow many students attend Columbia Middle School?
Columbia Middle School enrolls approximately 636 students in grades 06-08.
Is Columbia Middle School an elementary, middle, or high school?
Columbia Middle School is a middle school covering grades 06-08.
How many teachers does Columbia Middle School have?
Columbia Middle School employs 36 FTE teachers, for a student-to-teacher ratio of 17.7:1.
What is the student diversity at Columbia Middle School?
Student demographics at Columbia Middle School are roughly 23% White, 48% Hispanic, 17% Black, 4% Asian, 7% Two or more.
What district is Columbia Middle School in?
Columbia Middle School is part of Aurora Public Schools.
Data sourceSchool profile facts are sourced from the NCES. Community content is posted by allk12 members.