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What do you wish you knew before starting at Valley Middle School of STEM?
Community prompt from u/allk12. Replies below.
Enrollment
1,090
Middle
DISTRICT 1,103 · STATE 495
SCHOOL COMMUNITY·ROSEMOUNT-APPLE VALLEY-EAGAN·NCES 273239001383
Valley Middle School of STEM
900 GARDEN VIEW DR, APPLE VALLEY, MN 55124 · (952) 431-8300 · Dakota County
GRADES 06–08MIDDLE21-SUBURBTITLE IREGULAR SCHOOL1,090 STUDENTS
C+
allk12 Grade
Scored higher than 35% of Minnesota 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.
- CBeats 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 Minnesota public middle schools
Student : Teacher
15.9:1
69 FTE teachers
DISTRICT 17.4:1 · STATE 17.5:1
Free / Reduced Lunch
45%
487 students
DISTRICT 33% · STATE 48%
Community
5
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 | 386 | 35% |
| Grade 7 | 352 | 32% |
| Grade 8 | 352 | 32% |
Student demographics
73%Diversity index
The chance that two students picked at random belong to different racial or ethnic groups.
DISTRICT 64% · STATE 60% · 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
MCA 2024-25 . % Meets or Exceeds StandardsEnglish Language Arts
41.9%
MN avg 49.7%
Math
35.5%
MN avg 45.3%
What this means: On the MCA, Minnesota's statewide test, about 42 of every 100 students at this school read and write at grade level and about 36 of 100 do math at grade level. Across all Minnesota schools, those numbers are about 50 and 45.
Source: MCA. 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
35.5%
composite math + reading, all grades
Predicted
41.0%
based on MN schools with similar FRL share
Beats by
-5.5pp
below demographic expectation
What this means: About 36% of students here test proficient in math and reading, compared with the roughly 41% typical for Minnesota 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 Minnesota'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 Valley Middle School of STEM
Valley Middle School of STEM's state test result (35.5% proficient) is higher than 2 of the 5 schools below with a result.
| School | Students | Low-income | Proficient |
|---|---|---|---|
| Valley Middle School of STEM this school | 1,090 | 44.7% | 35.5% |
| PLYMOUTH MIDDLE PLYMOUTH | 749 | 49.4% | 29.6% |
| Westwood Intermediate & Middle Sch BLAINE | 1,646 | 45.9% | 33.7% |
| Shakopee East Middle School SHAKOPEE | 828 | 42.9% | 37.9% |
| FRIENDLY HILLS MIDDLE MENDOTA HEIGHTS | 785 | 41.1% | 44.2% |
| ST. LOUIS PARK MIDDLE SCHOOL SAINT LOUIS PARK | 965 | 37.4% | 40.6% |
Matched among Minnesota 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 Valley Middle School of STEM ranks
Among middle schools| Measure | This school | In Minnesota | In Dakota County |
|---|---|---|---|
| State test proficiency ranked highest first | 35.5% | #170 of 245 | #15 of 17 |
| Math proficiency ranked highest first | 35.5% | #151 of 245 | #12 of 17 |
| Reading proficiency ranked highest first | 41.9% | #182 of 245 | #15 of 17 |
| Enrollment ranked largest first | 1,090 | #25 of 306 | #5 of 20 |
| Students per teacher ranked fewest first | 15.9:1 | #77 of 210 | #5 of 16 |
| Diversity index ranked most diverse first | 72.6% | #16 of 216 | #1 of 16 |
| Free and reduced lunch ranked highest share first | 44.7% | #80 of 252 | #4 of 17 |
| Enrollment change since 2017-18 ranked fastest growth first | +4.7% | #44 of 66 | #5 of 7 |
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
1,090
+11 (+1%) vs 2020
-17% since 1990-91, when it was 1,307
Student : Teacher
15.9:1
was 20.4:1
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 | 1,090 | 68.7 | 15.9:1 | 45% (487) |
| 2023-24 | 1,060 | 68.1 | 15.6:1 | 45% (477) |
| 2022-23 | 1,076 | 61.4 | 17.5:1 | 48% (516) |
| 2020-21 | 1,079 | 53 | 20.4:1 | 29% (313) |
| 2017-18 | 1,041 | 58.7 | 17.8:1 | 39% (403) |
| 2015-16 | 936 | 53 | 17.7:1 | 41% (384) |
| 2010-11 | 911 | 54 | 16.9:1 | 35% (317) |
| 2000-01 | 1,151 | 66 | 17.4:1 | 12% (138) |
| 1990-91 | 1,307 | 77 | 17.0:1 | N/A |
Source: NCES Common Core of Data. Rows are the federal collections on file for Valley Middle School of STEM.
Since 2017-18: students up 5% (1,041 to 1,090); teachers up 17% (58.7 to 68.7).
About Valley Middle School of STEM
Students in APPLE VALLEY, Minnesota, attend Valley Middle School of STEM, a large middle-grades school. The latest federal count shows 1,090 students in grades 6 through 8. Against the 495-student average for middle schools in Minnesota, enrollment here is 120% higher.
Federal data list 36 schools in ROSEMOUNT-APPLE VALLEY-EAGAN, with 29,224 students enrolled.
No single group makes up more than half of enrollment at Valley Middle School of STEM. The largest is White students, at 41%. The remaining students are 23% Black, 19% Hispanic, 12% multiracial, and 4% Asian. Census figures show Dakota County is about 74% White. Pick two students at random and there is a 73% chance they belong to different racial or ethnic groups; that figure is the school's diversity index.
Valley Middle School of STEM employs 68.7 full-time-equivalent teachers. That gives a ratio of about 15.9:1. This ratio sits 1.6 below the 17.5:1 average for middle schools in Minnesota. Free or reduced-price lunch eligibility was 45% in 2024-25. The 34% average for public schools in Dakota County is 11 points lower.
The allk12 Grade for Valley Middle School of STEM is C+. Compared with Minnesota public middle schools, the school scored higher than 35% on a mix of test scores, poverty-adjusted results, and recent trend.
Valley Middle School of STEM is 5.5 points below its predicted average proficiency rate on state tests (35.5% versus 41.0%), which places it in neither the top nor the bottom 10% in Minnesota.
Dakota County census figures show that the median household income is $106,318, a bachelor's degree or higher is held by about 45% of adults, and the poverty rate is about 4%. Dakota County is home to 170 public schools and about 74,687 public school students.
The school nearest to Valley Middle School of STEM is SOUTHVIEW ELEMENTARY, at a distance of less than a tenth of a mile. Other public schools within five miles number at least 8. The average proficiency across nearby scored schools is 44.5%; Valley Middle School of STEM's is 35.5%, ranking 7th of 8.
In the federal locale system, Valley Middle School of STEM is coded Suburb: Large, for schools in a suburban area outside a principal city, within an urbanized area with a population of 250,000 or more.
The school's size has been steady, with 1,079 students in 2020-21 and 1,090 in 2024-25. The ratio of students to teachers went from 20.4:1 to 15.9:1 over the same years.
Topics for discussion here include school events, clubs, and volunteer needs. Alumni can share how the school prepared them.
Dakota County at a glance
View full county profilePopulation
445,771
Census ACS
Median income
$106,318
Household, ACS
Bachelor's+
45%
Adults 25+
Poverty rate
4%
Below federal line
Schools in county
170
74,687 students
Quick facts
Related schools
Other schools in ROSEMOUNT-APPLE VALLEY-EAGAN
- ROSEMOUNT SENIOR HIGHHigh · 2,364 students
- EASTVIEW SENIOR HIGHHigh · 2,328 students
- EAGAN SENIOR HIGHHigh · 2,274 students
- APPLE VALLEY SENIOR HIGHHigh · 1,999 students
- SCOTT HIGHLANDS MIDDLEMiddle · 1,228 students
- DAKOTA HILLS MIDDLEMiddle · 1,184 students
Other schools in APPLE VALLEY
- EASTVIEW SENIOR HIGHHigh · 2,328 students
- APPLE VALLEY SENIOR HIGHHigh · 1,999 students
- SCOTT HIGHLANDS MIDDLEMiddle · 1,228 students
- FALCON RIDGE MIDDLEMiddle · 1,088 students
- GREENLEAF ELEMENTARYElementary · 747 students
- Cedar Park Elementary STEM SchoolElementary · 722 students
Nearby schools
- SOUTHVIEW ELEMENTARY0.1 mi · 576
- WESTVIEW ELEMENTARY0.8 mi · 500
- Cedar Park Elementary STEM School1.0 mi · 722
- OAK HILLS ELEMENTARY1.2 mi · 571
- APPLE VALLEY SENIOR HIGH1.2 mi · 1,999
- LAKEVILLE EARLY CHILDHOOD PROGRAM1.3 mi · 237
Frequently asked questions
About Valley Middle School of STEMWhat is the total enrollment at Valley Middle School of STEM?
Valley Middle School of STEM enrolls approximately 1,090 students in grades 06-08.
What age range does Valley Middle School of STEM serve?
Valley Middle School of STEM serves students from grade 06 through grade 08.
How many students per teacher at Valley Middle School of STEM?
Approximately 15.9:1 students per teacher at Valley Middle School of STEM.
What is the racial breakdown of students at Valley Middle School of STEM?
At Valley Middle School of STEM, the student body is approximately 41% White, 19% Hispanic, 23% Black, 4% Asian, 12% Two or more.
Is Valley Middle School of STEM public or private?
Valley Middle School of STEM is a public K-12 school, overseen by ROSEMOUNT-APPLE VALLEY-EAGAN.
Data sourceSchool profile facts are sourced from the NCES. Community content is posted by allk12 members.