Hoquiam Middle School

Hoquiam, WA · Grades 6–8

Neighborhood

Decoded Rank

All factors combined

Middle 40% decoded

#98 of 176

rural Washington schools

Performing as Expected

#489 in WA

Achievement Rank

Raw test performance

Bottom 15% achievement

#169 of 176

rural Washington schools

#1458 in WA

places from achievement to Decoded Rank

Decoded performance is roughly in line with expectations for this school's context.

Data confidence:High226 students tested 8 years99% participation

Confidence is computed from sample size, year coverage, and participation rate. Higher confidence means the rank shift is stable across years and not driven by a single small cohort.

  • Tested students: total students with valid scores across all reported years.
  • Years of data: number of school years included. More years smooths year-to-year noise.
  • Participation: share of enrolled students who took the assessment. Low participation can bias scores.

What's driving this rank

Decoded Rank: #98 of 176

in rural Washington schools

Raw test scores rank this school #169, but after accounting for context, students here outperform what the data would predict. The Decoded Rank places it at #98.

Each component below is scored on a 0–100 within-metro scale. A qualitative band summarizes where the school lands.

  • Below averagePerforms above what its context predictsCounts for 35% of the rank

    After accounting for income and demographics, does this school beat what the data would predict?

  • About averageStudents gain ground year over yearCounts for 30% of the rank

    Are kids at this school learning faster than typical for the metro?

  • StrongEquity within the schoolCounts for 15% of the rank

    Are students clustered at similar levels, or split between top and bottom?

  • About averageDirection over recent yearsCounts for 10% of the rank

    Is this school's Decoded Rank trending up or down across the years we have data for?

  • StrongMost students were testedCounts for 10% of the rank

    Was the rank computed against a representative share of the school's students?

Show the numbersFor the methodology-curious

Each component is converted to a 0–100 within-metro percentile (100 = top of the metro). "Contribution" is the percentile-points the component adds to (or subtracts from) the metro median before the schools are re-ranked into the composite.

Per-component contributions to this school's Decoded Rank composite. Weight is the share each component carries; percentile is the school's within-metro score on that component.
ComponentWeightPercentileContribution
Performs above what its context predicts 35%24-9.1
Students gain ground year over year 30%51+0.3
Equity within the school 15%96+6.9
Direction over recent years 10%50+0.0
Most students were tested 10%99+4.9

How the Decoded Rank composite is computed

Why trust this?
  • Public data sources
  • Context-adjusted model
  • Confidence shown
  • Methodology published

This score uses state assessment data, NCES enrollment data, and Census ACS 5-year neighborhood data. The Decoded Rank adjusts for school context — student demographics, ELL/SPED service rates, and the socioeconomic profile of the surrounding tract — and shows how the school performs relative to expectation, not in absolute terms.

SchoolDecoder is one signal, not a verdict. Decoded Rank is a context-adjusted residual, not a causal claim about teaching quality. See full methodology →

All Rankings

How this school ranks across the metro, state, and among demographic peers.

ScopeAchievementDecodedShift
Within Rural Washington (176 schools)#169#98
WA (1506 schools)#1458#489

Resource context

School inputs, not ranking points

These fields describe the school and surrounding neighborhood. They help readers interpret the page, but this is not a dollar-by-dollar or ratio-by-ratio scorecard and the fields here are not components of the Decoded Rank.

Enrollment
372
Free/reduced-price lunch
69.4%
Student-teacher ratio
20.7:1
Locale
Town, remote
School type
Regular public school
Enrollment model
Neighborhood attendance area
Neighborhood median income
$46,372ACS tract proxy
Neighborhood poverty
0.2%ACS tract proxy
SES index
13.7
Assessment data year
2025
CCD year
2024
ACS vintage
2020-2024

Performance Spread

How students are distributed across the four state-assessment proficiency levels — L1: below standard, L2: approaching, L3: meets (proficient), L4: exceeds. This describes the shape of results at the school, not their height.

Students at this school cluster closely on the proficiency ladder.

  • Level 1 — Below standard54%
  • Level 2 — Approaching standard27%
  • Level 3 — Meets standard (proficient)13%
  • Level 4 — Exceeds standard4%

Performance Spread measures how evenly students are distributed across the L1..L4 proficiency ladder, treating the levels as an ordered scale (L1=1, L2=2, L3=3, L4=4) and weighting each by its student share. A school where most students cluster at one level has a TIGHT spread; a school split between the bottom and top has a WIDE or BIMODAL spread. Bimodal fires only when BOTH tails are non-trivial AND the middle is relatively hollow (pct_L1 ≥ 15, pct_L4 ≥ 25, pct_L2 + pct_L3 ≤ 60). It describes shape — NOT how high the school's scores are. Methodology

Nearby Schools

Sorted by distance. Both rank columns shown so you can compare quickly.

No nearby schools have been ranked yet.

Similar Schools

Schools with comparable demographics, income, and size. Both rank columns shown for direct comparison.

SchoolAchievementDecodedShiftStoryConfidence
Longview Elementary Rankings coming soon.
Lacey Elementary#47#38High
Cooper Elementary#92#28High
Spanaway Elementary#481#73High
Cordata Elementary School#38#28High

Historical Ranks

Year-by-year decoded and achievement ranks. Pandemic-affected years are excluded — we don't interpolate scores across the gap.

YearAchievementDecodedShift
2025Excluded
2024Excluded
2023Excluded

Note: assessment transitions (where a state changes its test) are footnoted on the methodology page; trends are not computed across breakpoints.

Trajectory

Not enough years yet

Trajectory will appear with 2025-26 data once we have two or more years of rankings for this school.

How this works: we fit a linear trend across the available years of Decoded percentile, then bucket the slope into a direction. Wide confidence intervals (uncertain trends) collapse to Holding steady. See the methodology page for thresholds.

Cohort Progression

Kids who started 6th grade here in 2015 gained 28 proficiency points by 8th grade.

Based on 16 cohorts across math + ELA.

Learning rate: +6.0 proficiency points/yr (95% CI -0.1 to 12.1)

Medium confidence

Cohort 20152016201720182019202320242025 Slope
ELA · started 8th in 2015
G8
242
ELA · started 7th in 2015
G7
209
G8
227
+17.8
ELA · started 6th in 2015
G6
176
G7
211
G8
204
+14.1
ELA · started 6th in 2016
G6
214
G7
208
G8
197
-8.5
ELA · started 6th in 2017
G6
215
G7
241
G8
217
+1.4
ELA · started 6th in 2018
G6
214
G7
233
+18.7
ELA · started 6th in 2019
G6
180
ELA · started 8th in 2023
G8
181
ELA · started 7th in 2023
G7
193
G8
187
-6.1
ELA · started 6th in 2023
G6
170
G7
205
G8
181
+5.3
ELA · started 6th in 2024
G6
182
G7
206
+23.7
ELA · started 6th in 2025
G6
190
Math · started 8th in 2015
G8
217
Math · started 7th in 2015
G7
184
G8
172
-11.6
Math · started 6th in 2015
G6
147
G7
200
G8
181
+17.1
Math · started 6th in 2016
G6
186
G7
174
G8
203
+8.5
Math · started 6th in 2017
G6
194
G7
194
G8
202
+3.8
Math · started 6th in 2018
G6
205
G7
204
-1.2
Math · started 6th in 2019
G6
186
Math · started 8th in 2023
G8
152
Math · started 7th in 2023
G7
161
G8
156
-5.5
Math · started 6th in 2023
G6
143
G7
178
G8
148
+2.5
Math · started 6th in 2024
G6
154
G7
183
+28.6
Math · started 6th in 2025
G6
180

How this works: we follow each grade-cohort across years through the school (3rd graders in 2023 are 4th graders in 2024, etc.) and fit a linear slope on a 100–400 proficiency-points scale built from the state assessment's four levels (L1=1, L2=2, L3=3, L4=4, weighted by student share). This is the same construction Stanford SEDA uses (edopportunity.org/methods); it's not student-level tracking — we measure the school's cohort, not individuals. See the methodology page for thresholds.

Evidence & technical detailClick to expand

School Alpha

School Alpha is the residual between actual and expected performance once school context is held constant. It is a context-adjusted estimate, not a causal claim about teaching quality.

Shrunk Alpha (95% CI)
-0.17 (95% CI: -0.19 to -0.16)

SES index components

SES method
Blended SES index (ACS + FRL)
SES index value
13.7
FRL %
69.4%
ELL %
SPED %
Tract median income (ACS 5-year)
$46,372
Tract poverty rate
0.2%
Tract % bachelor's+
20.6%

What "Decoded Rank" means

Decoded Rank converts School Alpha — the context-adjusted residual — into a parent-facing rank within the metro pool. A higher Decoded Rank than Achievement Rank means the school's raw scores understate its performance once neighborhood and school context are held constant. The reverse means raw scores overstate it. The rank is one signal, not a verdict.

Data & sources

Assessment data
2024–25 school year
NCES CCD vintage
2024
Census ACS 5-year vintage
2020-2024
Last updated
May 29, 2026
Methodology version
0.2.0

SchoolDecoder publishes context-adjusted residuals, not causal estimates. Decoded Rank is one signal — not a verdict on teaching quality. Read about limitations →