The 10 Dumbest Places In Georgia For 2024


The dumbest places in Georgia are Monroe and Forest Park for 2024 based on Saturday Night Science.

The unfortunate fact of the matter is that some places in the Peach State have a larger percent of their population that never graduated from high school.

While the emphasis on going to college might be overblown, the fact is that not graduating from high school puts you at a significant disadvantage on average. Educational attainment might not be the best way to measure one person’s intelligence, but it does shine a light on the state.

We will use Saturday Night Science to determine what places in Georgia have the highest percentage of adults without a high school degree.

A recent study we published found that Georgia is the 40th smartest state in the United States, with an average IQ of 98.

But that doesn’t mean that a few cities in Georgia are a bit slower than others due to a lack of basic education.


Table Of Contents: Top Ten | Methodology | Summary | Table


Dumbest Cities In Georgia Map

Don’t freak out.

Some places are just smarter than others, but that says nothing about the character of the people living there. It’s another data point a real estate agent would never tell you.

For this ranking, we only looked at cities with populations greater than 5,000, leaving us 126 cities in Georgia to rank. You can take a look at the data below.

For more Georgia reading, check out:

The 10 Dumbest Places In Georgia For 2024

Monroe, GA

Source: Wikipedia User Ncsr11 | CC BY-SA 3.0
Overall SnackAbility

5
/10
Population: 15,036
% Adult High School Dropout: 28.0%
% Highly Educated: 13.0%
More on Monroe: Data | Crime | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Forest Park, GA

Source: Public domain
Overall SnackAbility

2
/10
Population: 19,619
% Adult High School Dropout: 24.0%
% Highly Educated: 10.0%
More on Forest Park: Data | Crime | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Blakely, GA

Source: Wikipedia User Robbie Honerkamp | CC BY-SA 3.0
Overall SnackAbility

5
/10
Population: 5,299
% Adult High School Dropout: 23.0%
% Highly Educated: 11.0%
More on Blakely: Data | Crime | Real Estate

Thomson, GA

Source: Public domain
Overall SnackAbility

5
/10
Population: 6,839
% Adult High School Dropout: 20.0%
% Highly Educated: 10.0%
More on Thomson: Data | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Camilla, GA

Source: Wikipedia User Michael Rivera | CC BY-SA 3.0
Overall SnackAbility

3
/10
Population: 5,163
% Adult High School Dropout: 19.0%
% Highly Educated: 8.0%
More on Camilla: Data | Crime | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Cordele, GA

Source: Wikipedia User Michael Rivera | CC BY-SA 3.0
Overall SnackAbility

1
/10
Population: 10,210
% Adult High School Dropout: 22.0%
% Highly Educated: 14.0%
More on Cordele: Data | Crime | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Cedartown, GA

Source: Wikipedia User Cculber007 at en.wikipedia | GFDL
Overall SnackAbility

2
/10
Population: 10,166
% Adult High School Dropout: 24.0%
% Highly Educated: 16.0%
More on Cedartown: Data | Crime | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

8. Glennville

Glennville, GA

Source: Wikipedia User Johnnykick2351 | CC BY-SA 3.0
Overall SnackAbility

5
/10
Population: 5,204
% Adult High School Dropout: 20.0%
% Highly Educated: 14.0%
More on Glennville: Crime | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Cairo, GA

Source: Wikipedia User Michael Rivera | CC BY-SA 3.0
Overall SnackAbility

4
/10
Population: 10,091
% Adult High School Dropout: 20.0%
% Highly Educated: 14.0%
More on Cairo: Data | Crime | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Morrow, GA

Source: Public domain
Overall SnackAbility

4
/10
Population: 6,563
% Adult High School Dropout: 24.0%
% Highly Educated: 18.0%
More on Morrow: Data | Crime | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Methodology: How we determined the dumbest cities in the Peach State

We realize that formal education is only part of it when it comes to being intelligent, but on the other hand, knowing the difference between they’re, their, and there is always going to make you look pretty stupid.

So, we used Saturday Night Science to narrow down our criteria to focus on a city’s educational opportunities and what percentage of the population takes advantage of those opportunities.

In short, we came up with these criteria to determine the dumbest cities in Georgia:

  • % of the city’s population with less than a high school education (Age 25+)
  • % of city’s population with a college degree (Age 25+)

We got the data from the U.S. Census 2018-2022 American Community Survey.

Then, our algorithm generates a rank for each place in these categories. After crunching all the numbers, a ranking of the cities in Georgia from dumbest to brightest.

For this ranking, we used every Georgia city with at least 5,000 residents. We updated this article for 2024, and it’s our tenth time ranking the dumbest cities in Georgia.

There You Have It – Now That You’re Asleep

If you’re measuring the locations in Georgia where there are a high number of dropouts and adults who never received a formal education, this is an accurate ranking.

The dumbest cities in Georgia are Monroe, Forest Park, Blakely, Thomson, Camilla, Cordele, Cedartown, Glennville, Cairo, and Morrow.

If you’re also curious enough, here are the smartest places in Georgia, according to science:

  1. Dunwoody
  2. Milton
  3. Alpharetta

For more Georgia reading, check out:

Dumbest Cities In Georgia For 2024

Rank City Population % Adult High School Dropout % Highly Educated
1 Monroe, GA 15,036 28.0% 13.0%
2 Forest Park, GA 19,619 24.0% 10.0%
3 Blakely, GA 5,299 23.0% 11.0%
4 Thomson, GA 6,839 20.0% 10.0%
5 Camilla, GA 5,163 19.0% 8.0%
6 Cordele, GA 10,210 22.0% 14.0%
7 Cedartown, GA 10,166 24.0% 16.0%
8 Glennville, GA 5,204 20.0% 14.0%
9 Cairo, GA 10,091 20.0% 14.0%
10 Morrow, GA 6,563 24.0% 18.0%
11 Bainbridge, GA 14,234 22.0% 17.0%
12 Calhoun, GA 17,184 26.0% 19.0%
13 Lafayette, GA 6,929 17.0% 9.0%
14 Douglas, GA 11,694 19.0% 15.0%
15 Swainsboro, GA 7,542 17.0% 11.0%
16 Fort Valley, GA 8,821 24.0% 19.0%
17 Griffin, GA 23,485 20.0% 18.0%
18 Sylvester, GA 5,622 16.0% 13.0%
19 Toccoa, GA 9,055 18.0% 17.0%
20 Jackson, GA 5,497 16.0% 12.0%
21 Adel, GA 5,571 20.0% 19.0%
22 Sandersville, GA 5,727 19.0% 19.0%
23 Oakwood, GA 5,132 18.0% 19.0%
24 Dalton, GA 34,358 29.0% 24.0%
25 Waycross, GA 13,856 17.0% 18.0%
26 Moultrie, GA 14,533 20.0% 20.0%
27 Auburn, GA 7,794 14.0% 15.0%
28 Rockmart, GA 5,113 15.0% 17.0%
29 Thomaston, GA 9,720 15.0% 17.0%
30 Clarkston, GA 14,553 22.0% 24.0%
31 Brunswick, GA 15,243 18.0% 20.0%
32 Gainesville, GA 42,780 24.0% 25.0%
33 Commerce, GA 7,391 15.0% 18.0%
34 Dublin, GA 15,985 17.0% 20.0%
35 Fitzgerald, GA 8,972 12.0% 14.0%
36 Austell, GA 8,109 17.0% 21.0%
37 Tifton, GA 17,059 16.0% 20.0%
38 Lilburn, GA 14,741 25.0% 28.0%
39 Waynesboro, GA 5,720 12.0% 15.0%
40 Dacula, GA 6,906 20.0% 24.0%
41 Riverdale, GA 14,933 13.0% 18.0%
42 Jesup, GA 9,820 14.0% 19.0%
43 Barnesville, GA 6,200 11.0% 16.0%
44 Americus, GA 16,020 16.0% 22.0%
45 Albany, GA 68,926 16.0% 23.0%
46 Milledgeville, GA 17,021 16.0% 24.0%
47 Doraville, GA 10,691 24.0% 32.0%
48 Buford, GA 17,222 21.0% 29.0%
49 Stone Mountain, GA 6,638 13.0% 20.0%
50 Rome, GA 37,621 18.0% 27.0%
51 Winder, GA 18,414 13.0% 21.0%
52 Temple, GA 5,395 11.0% 19.0%
53 Lagrange, GA 31,173 14.0% 23.0%
54 Dallas, GA 14,126 9.0% 18.0%
55 Covington, GA 14,190 14.0% 24.0%
56 Lawrenceville, GA 30,465 15.0% 25.0%
57 Eastman, GA 5,635 13.0% 23.0%
58 Conyers, GA 17,415 14.0% 26.0%
59 Thomasville, GA 18,744 14.0% 26.0%
60 Valdosta, GA 55,266 13.0% 26.0%
61 Chamblee, GA 29,980 21.0% 48.0%
62 Norcross, GA 17,530 18.0% 37.0%
63 Vidalia, GA 10,732 9.0% 22.0%
64 Fort Oglethorpe, GA 10,203 8.0% 20.0%
65 Cartersville, GA 23,103 12.0% 27.0%
66 Canton, GA 33,499 15.0% 33.0%
67 Cumming, GA 7,371 16.0% 36.0%
68 Villa Rica, GA 17,354 10.0% 26.0%
69 Hapeville, GA 6,566 14.0% 32.0%
70 Columbus, GA 204,572 12.0% 28.0%
71 Social Circle, GA 5,011 11.0% 27.0%
72 Carrollton, GA 26,622 14.0% 31.0%
73 Hinesville, GA 34,732 7.0% 21.0%
74 Grovetown, GA 16,049 9.0% 26.0%
75 Kingsland, GA 18,563 7.0% 22.0%
76 Lovejoy, GA 10,429 9.0% 27.0%
77 Eatonton, GA 6,369 6.0% 21.0%
78 St. Marys, GA 18,507 7.0% 24.0%
79 Port Wentworth, GA 11,103 12.0% 35.0%
80 Bremen, GA 7,209 10.0% 29.0%
81 College Park, GA 14,113 9.0% 28.0%
82 Loganville, GA 14,287 9.0% 28.0%
83 Locust Grove, GA 9,367 6.0% 23.0%
84 Savannah, GA 147,583 10.0% 30.0%
85 Centerville, GA 8,220 10.0% 31.0%
86 Perry, GA 21,279 8.0% 28.0%
87 Statesboro, GA 33,185 9.0% 28.0%
88 Stockbridge, GA 28,858 9.0% 30.0%
89 Byron, GA 5,687 8.0% 28.0%
90 East Point, GA 38,113 10.0% 36.0%
91 Newnan, GA 42,689 11.0% 38.0%
92 Mcdonough, GA 29,134 7.0% 28.0%
93 Marietta, GA 61,387 11.0% 46.0%
94 Acworth, GA 22,318 9.0% 33.0%
95 Warner Robins, GA 80,374 8.0% 31.0%
96 Snellville, GA 20,895 9.0% 37.0%
97 Sugar Hill, GA 24,947 10.0% 44.0%
98 Jefferson, GA 13,496 8.0% 36.0%
99 Hampton, GA 8,244 3.0% 24.0%
100 Douglasville, GA 35,252 8.0% 36.0%
About Nick Johnson

Nick Johnson earned his masters in Business Administration from the Drucker School At Claremont Graduate University. He has written for 39 publications across the country and ran the media relations department at Movoto, a real estate portal based in San Francisco. He has been featured in over 500 publications as an expert in real estate and as an authority on real estate trends.

Nick's the creator of the HomeSnacks YouTube channel that now has over 260,000 subscribers and is an excellent source to learn about different parts of the country.

15 thoughts on “The 10 Dumbest Places In Georgia For 2024

  1. Just because some adults dropped out or didn’t go to school it does not mean they are dump. Being uneducated is different than being dumb.

  2. I am from Cairo. I graduated high school, and have BSIT and MBA degrees. My IQ is in the upper 0.5% of the global populace. I work as an engineer in high tech.

    So maybe your criteria is less than scientifically derived? Perhaps the compilers and authors of the article should consider themselves for inclusion instead of Cairo.

    If you will notice, those towns that make up the top portion of the list have long and deep Democrat-run roots, which is why they have lost private businesses, are poorer, and rely more heavily on government. Those attributes lead to high dropout rates.

    Now, if you had surveyed known IQs, your results would have been more believable. Less educated does not mean less intelligent.

    1. So true they also look only at the percent of how many people dropped out plus there is this county in georgia where nobody can’t read fluently, I don’t see them anywhere

    2. Except the Majority of the top 10 are in the 14th and 3rd Districtus and the North West suburbs of Atlanta District 7. Your eloquence is appreciated but you just lied when you said these were all Democratic Towns. The seem to have Republican House Representatives.

  3. Utterly offensive, and disgusting… suggesting that high school graduation rates directly correspond to the intelligence of an entire community is just sad, and does nothing but showcase how uninformed the pseudo intellectual “journalist” who wrote this article truly is.

  4. What does the amount of people that didn’t finish high school or amount of dropouts have a thing to do with how intelligent someone is? Are you saying that knowledge from any other source is not recognized? Or you one of the school bred, book knowledge dumb asses? I’m just curious really cause the way you come to this conclusion is ridiculous. For the record, I’m not from any of “your” top 50 dumbest conclusions!

  5. Henry Ford did not finish school. You have got to asked how many people were included that were not born in the USA . That will wipe out all the stupid data you have collected. You also have to ask yourself why you wasted time doing this.

  6. Somebody has to cook the fries…! (I live in one of these ‘top 10’ towns however my IQ has been measured at 160. I did graduate high shool but dropped out of college and went eentrepreneural… Have made a lot of $$$s and need other folks to work and do the lower paying jobs.)

    1. Is spelling a sign of dumbness? *See my misspelling of ‘school’. (You want catsup on your fries sir? ; )

  7. Some of the most intelligent people I have ever met grew up in one of the top ten listed. Social pressures, high teen pregnancy rates, lack of structured and disciplined public schooling, lower cost of living, and a fairly rich entry level job market all contribute to these statistics.

    As one poster stated, a summary as this should also include a survey of the relative brilliance emerging from these areas.

  8. Oh my! I just wasted 10 minutes perusing this article/site. Geepers folks~ Did you all know that some dummies are sharing this as FACT. REALLY?
    I guess it creates jobs for those too lazy to get out and get the real numbers!
    Sadly, our numbers are somewhat dismal, but we are also working to address the issues……thanks for the encouragement~NOT

  9. I HIGHLY disagree with this list.. Tifton ga needs to be #1 on this list.. they are the dumbest mother f-ers I have ever encounter… they are so stupid here I can feel myself getting dumber just being around them all…

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