OVERALL GRADE:
School system: Average to above average
School Board leadership: Below average

COLLEGE PREPARATION:
Well above average

Duval County public school students who plan to attend college are generally well-prepared. Students score above average on the Scholastic Assessment Test and near the top 20 percent when compared to their peers.

CLASSROOM FUNDING:
Below average

SchoolMatch says the school system is spending only 56 percent of its budget on instruction when it should be spending 60 percent. That is about $23 million a year that should be spent in the classroom.

TEACHER ATTENDANCE:
Above average

Duval County teachers miss fewer days of school than their peers in most other school systems.

OVERCROWDED SCHOOLS:
Failing

Overcrowded schools are nothing new in some areas of the county. When looking at standards for how big schools should be to best educate students, Duval County's overcrowding problem looks dramatically worse.

LACK OF INFORMATION:
Failing

Duval County school officials compile vast amounts of data about their schools. But SchoolMatch says the data have not been organized or used effectively to manage the school system's resources, particularly when the system is as large as Duval's.