The research on smaller learning communities like freshmen academies is plentiful in the literature about its impact on the social and academic adjustments students must make when transitioning from middle school to high school. Past studies have shown where schools that set apart freshmen have seen positive results in student achievement. With accountability scoring the performance of ninth graders, schools are exploring setting apart freshmen in sections of the school building or on another campus in hopes of them achieving at higher levels. As a result, the purpose of this study was to examine student achievement of freshmen in three distinct school settings: high schools using a freshman wing, high schools using a freshman campus, and high schools using no facility to transition ninth graders. A mixed methods design was employed to fully investigate the reasons schools were choosing to set apart students in their first year of high school. A sample of 125 schools from the three groups was purposefully selected from a population of 349 public high schools in Georgia. The quantitative portion examined 2014 Ninth Grade Literature End of Course performances, credit accrual for freshmen, scores on the College and Career Readiness Index, and graduation rates of schools. The qualitative aspect of this study examined responses from 15 principal interviews about the effectiveness of the freshman facility design employed in their high school. An analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to determine if a significant difference existed among the three groups in the first research question. An analysis of themes in the responses to seven interview questions helped determine the results to the second and third research question. Results indicated a significant difference in only one category of the quantitative section of this study: credits earned in the freshmen year by students with a disability. Students with disabilities in high schools using a freshman campus earned significantly more credit than their counterparts in high schools using neither a wing or campus to transition freshmen. There was no significant difference in Ninth Grade Literature performance, credit accrual for all students, CCRPI scores, or graduation rates. Further results from the interviews with principals indicated high schools with freshmen campuses often originated from the combination of overcrowding in the schools and a surplus of facilities that could be repurposed into a freshman campus. Other results showed transition strategies used to help students adjust to high school were employed by schools in all three groups.