Clifford Davis Elementary

Clifford Davis Elementary is a large PK-5 school in the Fort Worth Independent School District (Isd) serving 868 students in an area of extremely high economic need, where over 97% of students qualify for free or reduced lunch. The school has faced persistent academic challenges, consistently ranking in the bottom 1-3% of Texas elementary schools over the past decade. In the most recent statewide ranking, it placed in the 1st percentile, making it the lowest-performing school in its immediate vicinity—far behind nearby Worth Heights Elementary (70th percentile) and Glen Park Elementary (48th percentile).

A critical differentiator is the school's performance on Spanish-language STAAR tests, where students taking the Spanish version often significantly outperform their peers taking the English version, and even district and state averages. For example, in 4th-grade Math, proficiency was 42.86% on the Spanish test versus 26.58% on the English test. This suggests that many students are English Language Learners who demonstrate strong academic potential when assessed in their native language. The school's Hispanic students have shown remarkable improvement, rising from the 2nd percentile statewide two years ago to the 36th percentile in the most recent year—the highest-performing subgroup at the school by a wide margin.

The school's large size and high student-to-teacher ratio of 21.9:1 (the highest among its peers, where ratios are typically 13-16:1) create significant challenges for individualized instruction. Per-student spending of $9,857 is in line with peers but lower than schools like Mitchell Boulevard Elementary ($17,794), suggesting funding alone isn't the issue. The success of nearby Worth Heights Elementary—which serves a similar demographic but with a smaller student body (439) and lower ratio (13.1:1)—demonstrates that high-poverty schools can achieve strong results, highlighting that Clifford Davis's size and ratio may be key structural barriers to improvement.