Five Kingsport Schools honored on U.S. News "best" list

KINGSPORT — Five schools in Kingsport's public school system ahve been ranked ranked in Tennessee's top 10% by U.S. News & World Report.The published rankings from U.S. News are for public elementary schools, middle and high schools, and Kingsport City Schools had at least one winner for 2025 in each category.In the elementary category, Kingsport's Adams, Johnson and Washington elementary school have been named by by the magazine as among of the 2025 Best Elementary Schools in Tennessee with silver medal designations. All told, 47,573 elementary schools were ranked nationally and 1,545 were ranked in Tennessee.In addition, Robinson Middle School has been named by U.S. News as one of the 2025 Best Middle Schools in Tennessee with a silver medal designation. In total, 23,861 middle schools were ranked nationally, and 1,043 were ranked in Tennessee.Finally, Dobyns-Bennett High School was named by the magazine as one of the 2025 Best High Schools in Tennessee with a silver medal designation.In total, 17,656 high schools were ranked nationally and 462 were ranked in Tennessee.In addition to being ranked in the top 10 percent in Tennessee, Dobyns-Bennett was also ranked in the top 10 percent nationally."Congratulations to the students, educators and leaders who have worked hard and invested deeply to support high-level learning for our students," KCS Superintendent Chris Hampton said in a news release. "This level of success does not happen by accident and we are proud to celebrate the accomplishments at these schools."All told, U.S. News has assigned 89,090 state ranks across its elementary, middle and high schools rankings.The elementary school and middle school rankings use the same methodology for all included grade levels. For each state, schools were assessed on their shares of students who were proficient or above proficient in their mathematics and reading/language arts state assessments.Half of the formula assessed the scores themselves and the other half incorporated the test results in the context of socioeconomic demographics. The top-ranked schools are all high-achieving and have succeeded at educating all their students. There is no national ranking — but there are distinct elementary and middle school rankings calculated at the state and district levels, as well as state rankings specific to charter schools.In coordination with North Carolina-based RTI International, a global nonprofit social science research firm, U.S. News ranked nearly 17,660 public high schools out of about 25,000 reviewed. This is the count of public high schools that had a 12th grade enrollment of 15 students or greater, or otherwise had sufficient enrollment in other high school grades, during the 2021-22 school year to be analyzed.For more information, go online to usnews.com/education/k12.KCS is located in Kingsport, serving students in the portions of Sullivan and Hawkins counties in the city limits and some tuition students outside that area.The district is comprised of 13 schools, including a pre-Kindergarten schools, eight elementary schools, two middle schools, one high school, a high school program of choice and an alternative learning program for middle and high school students. Total enrollment exceeds 7,400 students.