Renters and buyers alike rank schools high on their list of criteria when searching for a home. Mike and I own one investment property in a neighborhood that is split between two school districts–one good, one not so good. The value of the homes and the rents they can generate vary significantly, even within the same neighborhood, depending on which of the two school districts the house sits in.
Recently, I came across an online tool that can help you determine the quality of schools. It’s called, simply enough, Great Schools. 
Great Schools allows you to search for schools by city and state, and then select the school you’d like to research. Each school is rated on a scale of 1 to 10 based on a comparison of the school’s standardized test results to state-wide averages.
Great Schools also offers ratings of, and comments about, individual schools provided by other readers of the site, and an overview of state-provided information about the district, including teacher qualifications and student-teacher ratios.
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Do you know if there’s a way to tell which school a property is zoned to? I imagine someone at the school district could tell me, but I thought this might also be available online.
Jeff,
You could call, but who wants to sit on hold? Many (most?) local governments provide residential property information online, which generally includes the school district for a given address. In our area, the information is available through county auditor websites. We definitely use those sites on all investment prospects to verify school districts, but also a host of other information, such as size of the home, taxes, etc. Take a look at this article: http://www.twowiseacres.com/2007/10/23/capitalization-rate-a-not-quite-as-quick-but-a-little-more-accurate-comparison-of-rei/ that contains a reference to a good public records portal that should get you to the information you need.