As part of the National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988 (NELS:88), this study examined the schools attended by eighth-graders in 1988, the year during which the more than 25,000 eighth-graders of the cohort were first studied. NELS:88 provides information on 802 public schools, 105 Catholic schools, 68 other religious schools, and 60 private, non-religious schools. Throughout the report, the unit of analysis is the school rather than students or teachers. Most of the school data were provided by school administrators. The data are used to develop a profile of the schools attended by eighth-graders, with information about various aspects of the learning environment, school policies and programs, and administrators' assessments of school climate. In 1988, 87.9% of eighth-graders attended public schools, 7.6% attended Catholic schools, 2.9% attended other religious schools, and 1.5% attended private non-religious schools. The study shows that eighth-graders learned under a wide range of different conditions in both public and private schools. Fifty-six data tables and five graphs are included. Appendices contain technical notes, information about the accuracy of estimates and procedures, standard errors and unweighted "N"s, and 56 additional tables. (SLD)