Needles Middle: The scores are below where anyone wants them. Here's what they don't tell you.
Needles posts low test scores — and test scores are one lens among several. If this is your zoned school, the numbers below are where to start a conversation, not where to end one.
| Scope | % Exceeded | % Met+ | Growth | Absence | Suspension | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| This school | 21 | 3% | 19% | -0.8 | 20.7% | 6.7% |
| CA average · Middle School | 43 | 17% | 39% | +1.5 | 18.5% | 3.7% |
Needles Middle scores 21 of 100 on SchoolScope's Scope Score — the 5th percentile of 2,238 California middle schools (CDE CAASPP 2025).
Measures test performance, attendance, and climate — not arts, community, or your kid. How we score →
🌱 Building Momentum — This label means the data doesn't clearly sort the school one way or the other — ask what the school is proud of, and what it's working on.
Most rating sites would stop at “19% proficient” and call it done. Needles deserves a closer read. The school sits in Needles, where four in five students qualify for free or reduced lunch — and reading the numbers without that context misreads the school.
Test scores are one lens, and at this school they're a rough one right now. The sections below show the fuller picture — including the parts that are working.
The seven-year arc
Has stayed near the 5th percentile since 2019.
Proficiency here is back to its pre-pandemic level — 19% meet the standard, about where the school stood in 2019.
| Grade | 2019 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 6 | 23% | 29% | 27% | 34% | 21% |
| Grade 7 | 35% | 17% | 33% | 33% | 37% |
| Grade 8 | 21% | 24% | 20% | 28% | 20% |
| Grade | 2019 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 6 | 19% | 13% | 9% | 11% | 9% |
| Grade 7 | 15% | 9% | 12% | 25% | 17% |
| Grade 8 | 15% | 3% | 12% | 9% | 9% |
The story this school is actually telling
The school, grade by grade
ELA · CAASPP 2024–25Different students, same year — each bar is one grade's proficiency mix.
The 5 things our score weighs
Ask what changed in the last two years, and what the school is asking families for. Growth shows up in these numbers a year or two after it shows up in classrooms.
- Ask whether the tour can step into a working classroom — watch how the teacher handles a student who's stuck.
- Ask to tour while school's in session, and notice how hallways and transitions feel — culture shows up between classes, not just in them.
- Ask how the school communicates with families when a child starts to struggle.
- Ask what a typical day looks like for a new student in the first few weeks.
How every group of students does here
At Needles Middle in Needles, 24.0% of low-income students met or exceeded the ELA standard in 2025, compared to 28.3% district-wide and 38.2% statewide. Needles Middle trails its district average for low-income students by 4.4 percentage points in ELA. Other subgroups: Low-Income students (7.8% Math proficient); White students (24.4% ELA proficient). The largest proficiency gap is 4.1 percentage points for low-income students. Data source: California Department of Education, CAASPP 2024-25. 167 students tested.
6 of 13 student groups here are too small to report — a privacy protection, not a gap.
Change in proficiency from the lowest tested grade — which groups gain ground the longer they stay. Groups with fewer than 10 tested students per grade are not shown.
Low-income student ELA proficiency falls by 2.2pp from grade 6 to grade 8 at this school. District average: -6.8pp.
Showing up, and staying in class
Where the path goes
The path below follows attendance boundaries — scores shown for each next step.
Estimated path based on proximity within the same district. Contact your school district for official feeder information.
The people teaching here
Pay is set by the district, not the school.
What gets spent here
These measure different things: this figure is spending attributed to this campus, while district-wide figures also include central administration, districtwide programs, and the state's pension contributions made on the district's behalf — costs that never get assigned to a single school. The district number runs higher at nearly every school, not just this one.
$482 per student arrives as federal Title funding — a measure of concentrated need, not school quality.
The district's current expense of education per student, from CDE's annual SACS filing — the freshest district spending figure the state publishes.
District-level, from the district's own SACS general-ledger filing — school-by-school breakdowns aren't published by the state.
Source: NCES F-33 · Full district breakdown →
The neighborhood it serves
Source: U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 5-year estimates (2024) · ZIP-level
At 196 students, this school is much smaller than the typical California middle school (≈860).
On the state's science test (CAST), 23% met or exceeded the standard — science is tested in grades 5 and 8 but never enters the Scope Score.
Frequently asked questions
Is Needles Middle a good middle school?
What are Needles Middle's CAASPP test scores?
How does Needles Middle rank in California?
Is Needles Middle getting better or worse?
What is the attendance and school culture like at Needles Middle?
How does Needles Middle compare to other schools in Needles?
How does Needles Middle serve low-income and underrepresented students?
Your other options
Private alternatives nearby
Private schools within ~10 miles. These schools do not participate in state testing and cannot be scored or ranked.
A low score doesn't tell the whole story. Read: Your School Scored Low — Here's What That Actually Means
Every number on this page
Score factors, grade-level breakdowns, subgroup proficiency, and peer comparisons.
| ELA | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT | MET+ | +/CA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 6 | 56 | 0% | 21% | 29% | 50% | 21% | −25 |
| Grade 7 | 76 | 5% | 32% | 34% | 29% | 37% | −11 |
| Grade 8 | 70 | 4% | 16% | 39% | 41% | 20% | −26 |
| Math | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT | MET+ | +/CA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 6 | 56 | 0% | 9% | 29% | 63% | 9% | −26 |
| Grade 7 | 76 | 8% | 9% | 41% | 42% | 17% | −17 |
| Grade 8 | 69 | 1% | 7% | 22% | 70% | 9% | −24 |
| Science (CAST) | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 5/8/11 | 69 | 3% | 20% | 59% | 17% |
CAST is tested in grades 5, 8, and once in high school — not annually. Not part of the Scope Score.
| Subgroup · ELA | Tested | MET+ | vs district | vs CA |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Socioeconomically Disadvantaged | 167 | 24.0% | −4 | −14 |
| White | 86 | 24.4% | −10 | −37 |
| Hispanic/Latino | 73 | 30.1% | −2 | −9 |
| School | Dist | Scope | EXC | MET+ | Growth | Susp |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Needles Middle ← | — | 21 | 3.1% | 18.8% | −0.8 | 6.7% |
| California average | — | 43 | 16.8% | 39.3% | +1.5 | 3.7% |
| Year | Scope | Pctile | Rank | Exc | Met+ | Absent | Susp | Growth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | 22 | 9 | #1827 | 5.3% | 21.3% | 20.5% | 13.7% | -3.2pp |
| 2022 | 14 | 2 | #2112 | 2.8% | 15.6% | 30.1% | 15.2% | -7.7pp |
| 2023 | 21 | 4 | #2089 | 3.2% | 18.8% | 35.2% | 15.0% | -2.2pp |
| 2024 | 22 | 12 | #1940 | 4.8% | 23.5% | 29.6% | 13.3% | -3.7pp |
| 2025 | 21 | 5 | #2120 | 3.1% | 18.8% | 20.7% | 6.7% | -0.8pp |
- — Low-income students here trail the state average for their group by 14 points in ELA — worth asking how the school is closing that gap.
| Group | 2019 | 2025 | Δ |
|---|---|---|---|
| Female | 17.6% | 21.2% | +3.6pp |
| Male | 23.5% | 20.4% | -3.1pp |
| Black/African American | 25.0% | — | — |
| Hispanic/Latino | 25.4% | 30.4% | +5.0pp |
| American Indian/Alaska Native | 14.0% | 22.7% | +8.7pp |
| Students with Disabilities | 21.3% | 27.5% | +6.2pp |
| Socioeconomically Disadvantaged | 24.3% | 23.1% | -1.2pp |
| All Students | 20.7% | 20.8% | +0.1pp |
| Two or More Races | — | 11.8% | — |
| Homeless | — | 33.3% | — |
SchoolScope scores and verdicts are our interpretation of public California Department of Education data — independent analysis, not an official rating. How we analyze · Request a correction