Cortez, CO schools
Cortez’s public schools score well below Colorado’s averages: 33% of students are proficient in reading against 47% statewide, and 82% of high schoolers graduate on time against 81.7%. Kids attend Mesa Elementary School or Kemper Elementary School through grade 5, then Montezuma-Cortez Middle School and Montezuma-Cortez High School.
Grades, test scores, graduation, spending and every school, from U.S. Department of Education data.
Cortez’s School Grade: C
The public schools Cortez’s kids attend, from kindergarten through graduation, trail 67% of Colorado’s districts on state tests and graduation. Among towns with similar incomes, they sit near the middle.
How the School Grade works
- Results, not inputs. Math and reading proficiency on Colorado’s state tests, each against the state average, plus the four-year graduation rate. Spending and class size are shown below but don’t count toward the grade. Tests: 2020–21; graduation: class of 2020.
- The whole path. A town’s grade follows its kids: every district that serves it, weighted by the number of students tested in each. Tests count 60% and graduation 40%.
- Graded within the state. Each state writes its own tests, so districts are lined up against the rest of Colorado only. A+ top 5%A next 10%A- next 10%B B+ to B−, next 30%C C+ to C−, next 30%D D and D−, bottom 15%
- Individual schools are graded the same way on their own test results, against every public school in Colorado with 25+ students. Private schools aren’t graded: they don’t take the state tests.
- What a grade can’t tell you. Test results track family income closely, so a high grade partly reflects who lives in a town. That’s why we also compare towns with similar incomes. Visit, ask other parents, and read neighbor reviews. It’s our own summary of U.S. Department of Education data, not an official rating.
Where Cortez kids go to school
Based on district boundaries from the U.S. Department of Education. Check with the district before you enroll.
Well below the state in reading
82% graduate on time
The share of students who started ninth grade together and earned a regular diploma within four years. #112 of 142 CO towns →
The district serving Cortez
Each district’s own page has its spending, test scores, enrollment and every school.
Colleges near Cortez
There’s no college within 30 miles of Cortez. The closest is Fort Lewis College in Durango, CO, 39.3 miles away.
Straight-line distance from the center of Cortez. Degree-granting colleges with students on campus.
All 8 schools in Cortez
School data from the U.S. Department of Education (NCES). Ratings are from neighbors on TownTapestry.