Lakewood Montessori Middle

Lakewood Montessori Middle is a middle school of tight-knit scale in Durham, North Carolina, one of the schools within Durham Public Schools, enrolling 309 students in grades 6 through 8. By comparison, North Carolina's public schools average about 605 students each, so Lakewood Montessori Middle sits 49% below that benchmark.

Within Durham Public Schools, which oversees 55 schools and 31,797 students, Lakewood Montessori Middle is one campus in the system.

On demographics, Lakewood Montessori Middle records that White students make up the majority at 58%; the rest comes out to 19% Hispanic, 17% Black, 5% multiracial. By comparison, Durham County as a whole is about 43% White, so the school skews noticeably more White than its surroundings.

Looking at school resources, On paper, Lakewood Montessori Middle has 20 full-time-equivalent teachers, translating to a class-load average of around 15.2:1. That tracks the state average closely. An estimated 99% of students are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch, which schools and policymakers use as a rough income-mix signal.

After controlling for student poverty, Lakewood Montessori Middle sits in the top 10% of North Carolina schools after the BeatsExpectations adjustment. Predicted proficiency for the school's FRL share is roughly 48.6%; actual is 84.8%, +36.2 points clear of the demographic baseline.

Around the school, the surrounding county (Durham County) logs that the typical household earns roughly $82,316 per year, 55% of adults hold a bachelor's degree or higher, and the poverty rate sits near 8%. Across Durham County's 74 public schools (combined enrollment of about 46,109 students), Lakewood Montessori Middle is one campus in the mix.

Lakewood Elementary is the nearest neighboring public school, about 0.4 miles from this campus. 8 of the 8 nearest public schools sit inside a five-mile radius. On composite proficiency, Lakewood Montessori Middle comes 2nd of 7 in the immediate cluster, ahead of the nearby-schools average of 58.7%.

The campus sits in a metropolitan setting.

Over the past 7-year window. Looking back 7 years, enrollment at Lakewood Montessori Middle has rose 5%, going from 295 students in 2018 to 309 in 2025. White enrollment moved from 38% to 58% across the same window. Class-load math has loosened: from 14.2:1 in 2018 to 15.2:1 in 2025.

On allk12, the feed for Lakewood Montessori Middle typically covers open house dates, ride-share offers, and field-trip permission slips. Anyone with firsthand experience at this school can post or comment.