Folsom, El Dorado County School Districts a Great Bargain: Study
Apr 20, 2015 12:30PM ● By Steven Jack
School Districts in Folsom and El Dorado County fared well in a recently online study of Best School Districts for Your Buck in California.
Financial site NerdWallet.com comprised the study using several criteria and discovered that No. 1 homeowners don't have to spend "a mint" to find a great school district in California and No. 2 there are many high-performing districts in more rural parts of the state.
"There are hidden gems throughout the state — places where children can still get an excellent public education and home prices aren’t reserved for the very wealthy," the study said.
To rank the top 375 school district's in California, NerdWallet used the following criteria collected from California Department of Education:
Folsom Cordova Unified School District finished with the highest area rank, coming in at No. 24. With a median home value in the district of $305,600, the average SAT Score is 1596, graduation rate 92.8 percent and average class size 23.06.
El Dorado Union High School District finished at No. 37. With a median home value in the district of $368,300, the average SAT Score is 1610, graduation rate 93.10 percent and average class size 23.54
According to NerdWallet, the score for each district was calculated from the following measures:
Financial site NerdWallet.com comprised the study using several criteria and discovered that No. 1 homeowners don't have to spend "a mint" to find a great school district in California and No. 2 there are many high-performing districts in more rural parts of the state.
"There are hidden gems throughout the state — places where children can still get an excellent public education and home prices aren’t reserved for the very wealthy," the study said.
To rank the top 375 school district's in California, NerdWallet used the following criteria collected from California Department of Education:
- Affordability
- Standardized test scores
- College readiness
- Class size
Folsom Cordova Unified School District finished with the highest area rank, coming in at No. 24. With a median home value in the district of $305,600, the average SAT Score is 1596, graduation rate 92.8 percent and average class size 23.06.
El Dorado Union High School District finished at No. 37. With a median home value in the district of $368,300, the average SAT Score is 1610, graduation rate 93.10 percent and average class size 23.54
According to NerdWallet, the score for each district was calculated from the following measures:
- Housing cost for each school district was 25% of the total score. Housing cost was calculated by averaging the district index score for median home values and selected monthly homeowner costs (which includes property tax) for the school district. The more affordable the area, the higher the cost score. Data are from the 2013 U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey.
- Standardized testing score was 35% of the total score. The SAT average and mean scale score for the high school STAR test were equally weighted. STAR tests that were included for our rankings were summative math, integrated math 3, biology and English language arts. Data are from the California Department of Education.
- College readiness for the class of 2013 was 30% of the total score. College readiness was a combination of a school district’s high school graduation rate, which is the percentage of students who graduate in the standard four years, and the percentage of students going on to four-year institutions for higher education. Data came from the California Department of Education.
- Student-to-teacher ratio or class size was 10% of the score. This score was manually calculated by dividing the number of full-time teaching staff in a school by the number of students enrolled. Data are from the California Department of Education.