Demopolis Middle School was recently ranked as the 46th best middle school in Alabama by the 2015 Niche Best Middle Schools report.

The Best Public Middle Schools report ranked 19,710 middle schools based on key student statistics and 4.6 million opinions from 280,000 students and parents.

For the purposes of this ranking, a middle school is considered to be a school that offers grades between 6 and 8 and has an average grade size of at least 15 students schoolwide.

In Alabama alone, according to the Alabama State Department of Education, there are 395 junior high schools and 195 middle schools.

The schools were ranked using data sourced from various government and public data sets, Niche’s own proprietary data, and 4,624,238 opinion-based survey responses across a variety of topics from 287,606 current students, recent alumni, and parents.

According to Niche, a high ranking indicates that the school is an exceptional academic institution with a diverse set of high-achieving students and faculty, and the students are very happy with their experiences.

DMS received a B+ for academics, a B for overall experience, B+ for teachers and an A for student culture and diversity.

“(The ranking) is something we are proud of and hopefully we can improve on that,” said DMS principal Blaine Hathcock. “There are over 500 schools that fall into the middle school category in the State of Alabama, so for us to be 46th is a big deal and is important and we’re glad to have some positive recognition for our school system. I’d like to commend our faculty and staff on that ranking.”

The top 10 middle schools in Alabama, according to the report, were Homewood Middle School, Mountain Brook Junior High School, Simmons Middle School, Auburn Junior High School, R.F. Bumpus Middle School, Drake Middle School, Liberty Park Middle School, Louis Pizitz Middle School, Berry Middle School and Discovery Middle School.