Similar nearby schools
Most similar nearby schools
Westfield Senior High School → Irvington High School → Columbia High School → Woodbridge High School → Union High School → Scotch Plains-Fanwood High School → John E. Dwyer Technology Academy → Rahway High School →📋 At a glance
- ✅ Dual-enrollment program (college credit while in HS)
- ✅ Gifted & talented program
- 🔢 3 calculus classes · 3 physics · 25 chemistry
- 🎓 AP rigor: 54th percentile nationally
- 🎓 4-yr grad rate: 92% (60th percentile nationally)
Composed from federal CRDC offerings, EDFacts ACGR, and other public data. Full breakdowns below.
How Linden High School compares for families
Solid mid-tier academic profile.
- ▸ StatewideAP rigor at the 54th percentile nationally.
- ▸ LocallyNJ students outperform the US average on NAEP 8th-grade math (+12 points).
- ▸ vs Similar SchoolsThe closest comparables nearby: Westfield Senior High School, Irvington High School, Columbia High School and 5 more. See the sidebar to compare side-by-side.
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🎓 Academic rigor
AP + advanced-course offerings
Strong — solid AP program + advanced courses
54th percentile nationally
✅ Gifted/talented program
Source: federal Civil Rights Data Collection (CRDC 2020-21). CRDC reports what's offered + enrolled — it doesn't collect AP exam pass rates (College Board owns that data and doesn't release it school-level).
SAT / ACT participation
CRDC federal data · 2020-21Source: federal Civil Rights Data Collection (CRDC 2020-21). Volume — not score — is what's reported here. A higher count means more students at this school are entering the college admissions pipeline. Note: 2020-21 was COVID-disrupted; some districts (especially those that stayed remote longer) report unusually low or zero takers.
🎓 4-year graduation rate · federal EDFacts
What % of students graduate on time?
60th percentile nationally
Source: federal EDFacts ACGR (Adjusted Cohort Graduation Rate), 2019 vintage via Urban Institute. EDFacts publishes a range (low-high) to preserve privacy on small cohorts; we display the midpoint.
👩🏫 Teacher workforce · federal CRDC
Teacher experience & reliability
Source: federal Civil Rights Data Collection (CRDC 2017-18 — the most recent vintage that publishes per-school teacher quality fields; the 2020-21 sweep had them suppressed). "Inexperienced" = teachers in their first or second year. "Chronic absence" = teachers absent 10+ days/year.
🏛️ Federal Title I context
Title I Schoolwide eligible
≥40% FRPL — qualifies for Title I Schoolwide program
40-74% of students qualify for free/reduced lunch. The district can use Title I funds across the whole school under federal Schoolwide Program rules.
Source: NCES Common Core of Data, free/reduced-price lunch eligibility. The actual Title I designation is a district decision and may differ from eligibility — but the federal eligibility math is what we show here. We don't claim to assert whether the district formally chose to enroll this school in Title I.
🏛️ Your state's public flagship
Rutgers University-New Brunswick
The in-state tuition gap is the flagship's biggest draw — most in-state families pay far less than the out-of-state sticker. Average net price after aid runs about $24,406/yr. Admission odds depend on your student's GPA and test scores, not which high school they attend.
Source: IPEDS admissions, tuition & enrollment + College Scorecard net price. Flagship = the state's primary public research university.
Chronic absenteeism
Why this matters to enrollment: Chronic absence is the most reliable early indicator that a student will leave a school — either by transferring out, dropping out, or matriculating to a charter or private alternative. At this level, today's absentees become next year's enrollment loss and the year-after's revenue loss. For school leaders: an Enrollment Trend Audit traces this dynamic forward →
Source: U.S. Department of Education, Civil Rights Data Collection 2020–2021. Rate = students chronically absent ÷ 2024 total enrollment.
Counselor capacity
Source: U.S. Department of Education, Civil Rights Data Collection 2020-2021. Counselor ratio = the school's most recent total enrollment ÷ counselor FTE. The American School Counselor Association (ASCA) recommends a 250:1 maximum; the US national median across schools with on-staff counselors is roughly 430:1.
Enrollment trend & projection
Total enrollment + grade 12, NCES Common Core of Data (2021–2024).
If the recent trend holds…
At its recent rate of +3.6%/year, projecting from 2024's 1,934 students:
An extrapolation of the recent trajectory, not a forecast of the school's plans; ignores one-off shocks.
Revenue upside
At $26,634 per student in district revenue, the 377 students projected to be gained by 2029 represent ≈ $10,041,018/year in additional funding.
District total revenue ÷ enrollment, NCES F-33. Public funding largely follows enrollment, so a shrinking class is a recurring budget hit.
Most similar nearby high schools
The schools most like this one — same type, blended on distance and size — and where their enrollment is heading. These are the schools families here weigh against each other.
| School | Type | Miles | HS enrollment | Trend |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Westfield Senior High School Westfield |
Public | 4.4 | 1,776 | -3.9% |
| Irvington High School IRVINGTON |
Public | 6.7 | 1,913 | +24.8% |
| Columbia High School MAPLEWOOD |
Public | 6.9 | 1,985 | +3.9% |
| Woodbridge High School WOODBRIDGE |
Public | 4.9 | 1,681 | +14.2% |
| Union High School UNION |
Public | 4.8 | 2,410 | +8.1% |
| Scotch Plains-Fanwood High School SCOTCH PLAINS |
Public | 6.3 | 1,562 | +1.8% |
| John E. Dwyer Technology Academy Elizabeth |
Public | 3.3 | 1,348 | +1.8% |
| Rahway High School RAHWAY |
Public | 2.3 | 1,286 | +11.0% |