Clintonville residents have valued education since the 1800s, when one-room log or brick schoolhouses served the area. The first of these was built around 1815-1820 near where McDonald's is, at the corner of High Street and California Ave.

The first substantial school was the Clinton School, a turreted brick edifice built in 1895 on the site of the current Clinton Elementary School. It served all grades until 1904, when high school students got their own building (the present Clinton Elementary Annex). The original building was demolished in 1922. An unusual feature of the school is the pedestrian subway built to allow school children to safely cross High Street.

In addition to Clinton, public schools in Clintonville currently include Crestview and Indian Springs elementary schools, Dominion Middle School and Whetstone High School. North High School, built in 1924 and closed as a Columbus Public High School in 1979, now serves as the North Adult Education Center. Other schools of the past and present include Glenmont Elementary (built 1952, closed 1976), Sharon Alternative, Colerain Elementary, and Calumet Elementary, now Calumet Christian.