The 10 Dumbest Places In Nebraska For 2023


The dumbest places in Nebraska are Schuyler and Crete for 2023 based on Saturday Night Science.

The unfortunate fact of the matter is that some places in the Cornhusker 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 Nebraska have the highest percentage of adults without a high school degree.

A recent study we published found that Nebraska is actually the 10th smartest state in the United States, with an average IQ of 101.

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

After crunching the numbers, we ranked the ten dumbest cities in the Cornhusker State.

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 30 cities in Nebraska to rank. You can take a look at the data below.

For more Nebraska reading, check out:


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


The 10 Dumbest Places In Nebraska For 2023

Schuyler, NE

Source: Public domain
Overall SnackAbility

8
/10
Population: 6,526
% Adult High School Dropout: 41.0%
% Highly Educated: 9.0%
More on Schuyler:  Cost Of Living | Crime Report

Crete, NE

Source: Public domain
Overall SnackAbility

6
/10
Population: 7,224
% Adult High School Dropout: 32.0%
% Highly Educated: 14.0%
More on Crete:  Cost Of Living | Crime Report

Lexington, NE

Source: Public domain
Overall SnackAbility

6
/10
Population: 10,325
% Adult High School Dropout: 35.0%
% Highly Educated: 15.0%
More on Lexington:  Cost Of Living | Crime Report

Fremont, NE

Source: Public domain
Overall SnackAbility

6
/10
Population: 27,245
% Adult High School Dropout: 12.0%
% Highly Educated: 19.0%
More on Fremont:  Cost Of Living | Crime Report

Grand Island, NE

Source: Wikipedia User Zancar | CC BY-SA 4.0
Overall SnackAbility

6
/10
Population: 52,755
% Adult High School Dropout: 18.0%
% Highly Educated: 20.0%
More on Grand Island:  Cost Of Living | Crime Report

Beatrice, NE

Source: Public domain
Overall SnackAbility

6
/10
Population: 12,276
% Adult High School Dropout: 11.0%
% Highly Educated: 19.0%
More on Beatrice:  Cost Of Living | Crime Report

Columbus, NE

Source: Public domain
Overall SnackAbility

7
/10
Population: 23,954
% Adult High School Dropout: 11.0%
% Highly Educated: 22.0%
More on Columbus:  Cost Of Living | Crime Report

Alliance, NE

Source: Public domain
Overall SnackAbility

6
/10
Population: 8,141
% Adult High School Dropout: 10.0%
% Highly Educated: 19.0%
More on Alliance:  Cost Of Living | Crime Report

Hastings, NE

Source: Public domain
Overall SnackAbility

6
/10
Population: 25,247
% Adult High School Dropout: 11.0%
% Highly Educated: 25.0%
More on Hastings:  Cost Of Living | Crime Report

North Platte, NE

Source: Public domain
Overall SnackAbility

6
/10
Population: 23,543
% Adult High School Dropout: 8.0%
% Highly Educated: 18.0%
More on North Platte:  Cost Of Living | Crime Report

Methodology: How we determined the dumbest cities in the Cornhusker 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 narrowed 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 Nebraska:

  • % 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 2017-2021 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 Nebraska from dumbest to brightest.

For this ranking, we used every Nebraska city with at least 5,000 residents. We updated this article for 2023, and it’s our tenth time ranking the dumbest cities in Nebraska.

There You Have It – Now That You’re Asleep

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

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

  1. Papillion
  2. Gretna
  3. Wayne

For more Nebraska reading, check out:

Detailed List Of The Dumbest Cities In Nebraska For 2023

Rank City Population
1 Schuyler, NE 6,526
2 Crete, NE 7,224
3 Lexington, NE 10,325
4 Fremont, NE 27,245
5 Grand Island, NE 52,755
6 Beatrice, NE 12,276
7 Columbus, NE 23,954
8 Alliance, NE 8,141
9 Hastings, NE 25,247
10 North Platte, NE 23,543
11 Plattsmouth, NE 6,558
12 Scottsbluff, NE 14,511
13 Ralston, NE 6,453
14 Norfolk, NE 24,964
15 Holdrege, NE 5,485
16 Sidney, NE 6,473
17 Gering, NE 8,521
18 Kearney, NE 33,558
19 Mccook, NE 7,425
20 Omaha, NE 488,059
21 York, NE 8,091
22 Bellevue, NE 62,888
23 La Vista, NE 16,786
24 Chadron, NE 5,376
25 Seward, NE 7,651
26 Lincoln, NE 289,136
27 Blair, NE 7,725
28 Wayne, NE 5,847
29 Gretna, NE 5,106
30 Papillion, NE 23,875
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.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *