Two elementary schools and three middle schools in the Poudre School District were ranked in the top 20 in Colorado in U.S. News and World Report’s 2025 annual rankings. Four out of five schools use the Core Knowledge curriculum.
Zach Elementary School, a neighborhood school in southeast Fort Collins, was ranked No. 5 among public elementary schools in Colorado by U.S. News & World Report, while the school district in southeast Fort Collins Trout, a selective school with no set standards, was rated no. 12.
The rankings, released Nov. 14, are for public schools only and are based on the percentage of students rated proficient or above in math and reading/language arts on state assessment tests. According to the methodology released with the annual rankings, the data used for the 2025 rankings is based on the U.S. Department of Education’s Common Core of Data for the 2022-23 school year.
Among middle schools, Compass Community Collaborative School ranked seventh, Liberty Common School ranked 13th and Kinard ranked 20th. Compass Community Collaborative and Liberty Common are both charter schools licensed by the Poudre School District, and middle school students attend the following classes: Same building as high school. Kinnard Middle School, like Trout Elementary School, is an all-choice school in southeast Fort Collins that does not have a defined attendance area for all PSD students.
Zack and Trout elementary schools, Liberty Common and Kinnard middle schools all use the Core Knowledge curriculum, while Compass Community Collaboration School uses a competency-based education model.
The only school in the region to make it into the top 50 in the 2025 U.S. News and World Report elementary and middle school rankings is Core Knowledge Charter School, chartered by the Windsor Severance School District, and Windsor Charter, which ranked No. 42 It was an academy. .
The magazine’s latest high school rankings will be released in April 2024, with three PSD schools in Colorado’s top 50, and will not be updated with new data until August 2025. In Colorado’s April high school rankings, Liberty Common School was No. 3, while Fossil Ridge was No. 44 and Ridgeview Classical School was No. 45. Fossil Ridge is a comprehensive high school located in southeast Fort Collins, and Ridgeview Classic is rated K. – Like Liberty Common, there are 12 charter schools that use the Core Knowledge curriculum.
Reporter Kelly Lyell covers education, breaking news, sports and other topics of interest to Coloradans. Contact us at kellylyell@coloradoan.com, x.com/KellyLyell and facebook.com/KellyLyell.news.
