Summary:
Zip code 36865 is home to just one elementary school, Loachapoka Elementary School, which serves students in Pre-K through 6th grade in the rural Loachapoka area of Alabama, operating within the Lee County school district.
For parents considering this school, the most important takeaway is that Loachapoka Elementary School serves a high-poverty community, with about 76% of students qualifying for free or reduced lunch. Despite this challenge, the school has a notably low chronic absenteeism rate of 8.7%, which is better than both the district (12.4%) and state (12.0%) averages, suggesting strong family engagement. The school also benefits from a favorable student-teacher ratio of 13.2:1, meaning smaller class sizes that could allow for more individualized attention. However, academic performance is a significant concern, particularly in mathematics, where proficiency rates across all grade levels (13-25%) lag far behind district (41-51%) and state (35-45%) averages. English performance is more mixed, with 3rd graders nearly matching the state average at 64.86%, but 4th graders dropping sharply to just 32.26% proficiency.
Performance at this school is also highly inconsistent from year to year and grade to grade. For example, 5th grade math proficiency fell from 40% to 18% between school years, while 3rd grade English jumped from 41% to nearly 65%. This volatility suggests challenges with consistent instructional quality or student mobility. On a positive note, 4th grade science proficiency nearly tripled from 8.89% to 24.19%, and the strong 3rd grade English results could serve as a model for other grades. Per-student spending of $11,072 is reasonable, but given the academic struggles, parents may want to ask how resources are being directed toward math intervention and curriculum alignment across grade levels.
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