City and district rankings from federal incident data · 2021-22 collection
In Louisiana, the school district is often the parish, so a single line on this page can cover every public school in a county-sized area. That makes the district rankings here worth reading slowly. What they rank is not how safe a place is. It is whether the safety records a school sent to the federal government hold up when we compare that school to about 1,500 schools nationwide of similar size teaching the same grades.
For the 2021-22 collection, Louisiana had 1,383 schools. We publish a safety score for 1,011 of them. We grade the reporting doubtful — a D or an E — at 117 schools, or 8.5% of the state. Nationally that share is 11.3%.
Read that comparison carefully. It means Louisiana schools filed records we could check more often than schools nationally did. It does not mean Louisiana children are safer than children elsewhere. Our comparison is not adjusted for state, and gaps between states in this collection are gaps in how districts fill out forms, not in what happens to kids.
Louisiana has 199 school districts. Only 50 have enough schools with scoreable records to be ranked at all. A district with a handful of schools, or one where most schools reported almost nothing, does not get a rank. That is the method holding its line, not a hole in it.
Among the 50 that do rank, Zachary Community School District comes out safer than 98% of ranked U.S. districts, with 5 of the 7 schools in its scored set complete enough to score. Ascension Parish is safer than 90%, with 28 of 31. Central Community School District is safer than 87%, with 5 of 5. Lincoln Parish is safer than 86%, with 11 of 12. St. John the Baptist Parish is safer than 85%, with 10 of 10.
If your own school shows no score, look at its grade. A C means it reported almost nothing but is small enough that a real zero is ordinary. A D or an E means schools its size usually report incidents and this one did not. That is a record we cannot verify. It is not a finding about the school.
Percentile is against all ranked U.S. cities (higher = safer). Only cities with ≥5 trustworthy-data schools are ranked. Home value is Zillow's ZHVI.
| # | CITY | SAFETY PCTL | SCHOOLS | HOME VALUE |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Zachary | 98 | 5 of 7 | $270,591 |
| 2 | Prairieville | 96 | 9 of 10 | $337,735 |
| 3 | Ruston | 95 | 8 of 10 | $231,864 |
| 4 | LaPlace | 94 | 5 of 5 | — |
| 5 | Crowley | 92 | 5 of 6 | $125,777 |
| 6 | Gonzales | 90 | 8 of 8 | $292,500 |
| 7 | DeRidder | 85 | 6 of 7 | $178,735 |
| 8 | Jena | 85 | 5 of 5 | $161,358 |
| 9 | Kentwood | 84 | 5 of 6 | $174,061 |
| 10 | Natchitoches | 84 | 9 of 10 | $191,148 |
| 11 | Sulphur | 84 | 11 of 12 | $203,575 |
| 12 | Lake Charles | 83 | 28 of 36 | $208,278 |
| 13 | Ville Platte | 83 | 5 of 5 | $106,666 |
| 14 | Abbeville | 83 | 8 of 8 | $139,316 |
| 15 | Eunice | 82 | 6 of 7 | $113,748 |
| 16 | Rayne | 81 | 6 of 7 | $175,712 |
| 17 | Chalmette | 78 | 6 of 6 | $213,569 |
| 18 | New Orleans | 78 | 38 of 78 | $247,590 |
| 19 | Franklinton | 77 | 7 of 7 | $190,443 |
| 20 | Ponchatoula | 76 | 6 of 7 | $250,798 |
| 21 | Opelousas | 74 | 10 of 12 | $129,235 |
| 22 | Monroe | 71 | 31 of 35 | $155,595 |
| 23 | Mandeville | 70 | 10 of 14 | $364,640 |
| 24 | Franklin | 70 | 5 of 5 | $93,490 |
| 25 | Leesville | 68 | 10 of 10 | $165,122 |
| 26 | Slidell | 68 | 18 of 20 | $224,547 |
| 27 | St. Martinville | 67 | 6 of 6 | — |
| 28 | West Monroe | 66 | 15 of 18 | $201,857 |
| 29 | Baton Rouge | 64 | 81 of 100 | $233,067 |
| 30 | Ferriday | 54 | 5 of 6 | — |
| 31 | Hammond | 53 | 5 of 6 | $225,540 |
| 32 | Kenner | 48 | 11 of 11 | $274,207 |
| 33 | New Iberia | 42 | 17 of 17 | $152,969 |
| 34 | Covington | 41 | 6 of 7 | $326,883 |
| 35 | Morgan City | 37 | 5 of 8 | $129,200 |
| 36 | Metairie | 36 | 17 of 19 | $334,224 |
| 37 | Shreveport | 32 | 50 of 54 | $147,051 |
| 38 | Gretna | 28 | 11 of 12 | $244,622 |
| 39 | Thibodaux | 26 | 9 of 13 | $231,802 |
| 40 | Minden | 24 | 5 of 5 | $136,194 |
| 41 | Marrero | 15 | 11 of 11 | $235,581 |
| 42 | Bossier City | 14 | 12 of 21 | $229,841 |
| 43 | Breaux Bridge | 12 | 5 of 5 | $189,754 |
| 44 | Harvey | 9 | 7 of 8 | $238,857 |
| 45 | Lafayette | 8 | 26 of 31 | $228,144 |
| 46 | Houma | 3 | 21 of 23 | $189,831 |
| # | DISTRICT | SAFETY PCTL | SCHOOLS |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Zachary Community School District | 98 | 5 of 7 |
| 2 | Ascension Parish | 90 | 28 of 31 |
| 3 | Central Community School District | 87 | 5 of 5 |
| 4 | Lincoln Parish | 86 | 11 of 12 |
| 5 | St. John the Baptist Parish | 85 | 10 of 10 |
| 6 | Allen Parish | 85 | 11 of 11 |
| 7 | Claiborne Parish | 83 | 6 of 6 |
| 8 | Evangeline Parish | 83 | 11 of 11 |
| 9 | Acadia Parish | 82 | 23 of 27 |
| 10 | Bienville Parish | 81 | 7 of 8 |
| 11 | Jefferson Davis Parish | 81 | 13 of 13 |
| 12 | Franklin Parish | 80 | 6 of 6 |
| 13 | Calcasieu Parish | 80 | 48 of 58 |
| 14 | St. Bernard Parish | 79 | 11 of 12 |
| 15 | Beauregard Parish | 79 | 10 of 12 |
| 16 | Jackson Parish | 76 | 5 of 5 |
| 17 | Grant Parish | 76 | 7 of 8 |
| 18 | East Feliciana Parish | 75 | 6 of 6 |
| 19 | City of Monroe School District | 74 | 19 of 19 |
| 20 | Richland Parish | 73 | 11 of 11 |
| 21 | West Carroll Parish | 73 | 5 of 5 |
| 22 | St. Landry Parish | 72 | 32 of 33 |
| 23 | Sabine Parish | 72 | 10 of 10 |
| 24 | LaSalle Parish | 72 | 9 of 9 |
| 25 | Assumption Parish | 70 | 8 of 9 |