Lisa Academy West Elementary School

Lisa Academy West Elementary School is a K-5 charter school in Little Rock, AR, serving 575 students as part of the Lisa Academy district, and it operates in a high-poverty area where over 73% of students qualify for free or reduced lunch.

Academically, the school faces significant challenges, scoring below both state and district averages in every subject. For example, only 23.8% of students were proficient in Math, compared to 39.8% for the Lisa Academy district and 44.1% for the state. This places the school at the 25th percentile statewide (1 star), making it a middle-of-the-pack performer in a highly polarized neighborhood. Nearby, high-performing schools like Jefferson Elementary (99th percentile) and Baker Elementary (89th percentile) achieve proficiency rates of 60-80%+, while struggling schools like Bale Elementary and J.A. Fair K8 Preparatory School (1st-6th percentile) often fall below 20%. Lisa Academy West outperforms these lowest-tier schools but lags far behind the top-tier ones.

Notably, the school has the highest student-to-teacher ratio (19.1:1) and lowest per-student spending ($10,447) among nearby schools, which is roughly half of what some Little Rock School District schools spend (e.g., McDermott Elementary at $20,488). Despite these constraints, there is a slight upward trend in test scores over the last three years, with ELA proficiency rising from 25.1% to 35.3% and Science from 21.7% to 34.3%. Interestingly, compared to its nearest neighbor, Terry Elementary School (0.93 miles away), which serves a similarly high-poverty population, Lisa Academy West performs slightly better in most subjects, suggesting it may offer a more effective educational environment for low-income students than the most proximate traditional public school option.