Summary:
ZIP code 95301 has two middle schools, both serving grades 7–8 in the Atwater Elementary district: Mitchell Intermediate and Bellevue Senior Elementary. In 2025–2026, neither school led in every subject, and both were below state proficiency levels across ELA, math and science. The most important shared concern is math and science: the schools’ average proficiency was 22% in math and 20% in science, compared with 38% and 36% statewide.
The subject leaders switch: Bellevue was ahead in ELA, at 44% versus Mitchell’s 43%, and science, at 21% versus 19%; Mitchell led in math, at 23% versus Bellevue’s 21%. Those differences were small—about 1 point in ELA, 2 in science and 2 in math—and neither school was a consistent top performer. SchoolDigger placed both in the 38th percentile statewide in 2025–2026, ranking Bellevue 1,688th and Mitchell 1,689th out of 2,703 schools. Grade-level ELA results also differ: Mitchell led Bellevue by 5 points in seventh grade, while Bellevue led Mitchell by 7 points in eighth grade.
Over time, the two-school ELA average edged up from 43% in 2024–2025 to 44% in 2025–2026, while the average math result fell from 23% to 22%; science moved from 20.4% to 20.3%. The group’s gap to the state narrowed slightly in ELA, from 6 to 5 points, but widened in math and science. SchoolDigger’s overall percentile ranking fell from the 51st to the 38th for Mitchell over three years; Bellevue went from the 45th to the 38th and then stayed there. Mitchell is much larger, enrolling 744 students compared with Bellevue’s 178; its 2024–2025 student–teacher ratio was 23.8, versus 15.2 at Bellevue. Bellevue also had a higher 2024–2025 free/reduced lunch eligible measure: 94%, compared with Mitchell’s 76%. These are contextual differences, not explanations for test results.
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