How Are Quad-City School Systems Compared To Others In America?

We are getting closer to the start of the 2022-2023 school year. We have plenty of summer left to go but since we are getting so close, it's fair to start talking about school things. Recently, a list showed the states with the best and worst school systems in America. The states that make up the Quad Cities area didn't do too terribly on this list but could definitely be higher.

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Our friends at WalletHub recently came out with their 2022's States with the Best & Worst School Systems showing which states have outstanding school systems and which ones need to improve. In this study, WalletHub only looked at public school systems.

In order to determine the states with the best and worst school systems, WalletHub compared the 50 states and the District of Columbia across two key dimensions:

Quality
Safety

WalletHub then evaluated those dimensions using 32 relevant metrics. Each metric was graded on a 100-point scale, with a score of 100 representing the highest quality of public education for grades K–12.

After doing a bunch of math, WalletHub determined each state and the District’s weighted average across all metrics to calculate its overall score giving them 2022's States with the Best & Worst School Systems.

Source: WalletHub

The Quad Cities includes two states: Iowa and Illinois. Looking at those two states, we can determine how good the school systems are in the Quad Cities area. Luckily, both states are in the top half of states with the best school systems but not by much.

WalletHub found that Iowa has better school systems than Illinois. Iowa is the 19th best state when it comes to a public-school education system. Iowa had an overall score of 54.25 and ranked 19th in both Quality and Safety. Iowa also has the 2nd lowest dropout rate.

Illinois wasn't far behind the Hawkeye state. WalletHub found that Illinois is the 23rd best state when it comes to a public-school education system. Illinois had an overall score of 53.23. Illinois ranked 18th in Quality and 29th in Safety.

Massachusetts ranked as the #1 state with the best school systems while New Mexico ranked 51st and was deemed the state with the worst school systems.