Summary:
ZIP code 95821 has two Katherine Johnson Middle and Arcade Middle, both in San Juan Unified and serving grades 6–8. They have similar enrollments: 612 students at Katherine Johnson and 595 at Arcade. In 2025–2026, their combined average proficiency was 17% in ELA, 10% in math and 15% in science, compared with state rates of 49%, 38% and 36%, respectively. The most important finding is that both schools are below state proficiency in all three subjects, although Arcade is closer to the state in each.
Arcade Middle stands out as the higher-scoring school: it had 23% proficiency in ELA, 14% in math and 23% in science, versus 10%, 6% and 7% at Katherine Johnson Middle. Arcade’s leads were 13 points in ELA, 8 in math and 16 in science. Katherine Johnson is lower in every subject, though its results improved year over year in all three. Arcade led in nearly every grade-level subject comparison; sixth-grade math was the near tie, while its largest grade-level lead was 18 points in eighth-grade ELA.
Recent results show different patterns: from 2024–2025 to 2025–2026, Katherine Johnson rose in all three subjects; Arcade improved by 4 points in science, while ELA fell by 3 points and math was nearly unchanged. SchoolDigger’s latest statewide ranking places Katherine Johnson at 2nd percentile with 0 stars and Arcade at 14th percentile with 1 star; their earlier percentiles were 1 and 33, respectively. Context also differs: in 2024–2025, Katherine Johnson’s student-teacher ratio was 18.5 compared with Arcade’s 24.2, and the schools reported 90% and 83% free/reduced lunch eligible, respectively. In 2025–2026, chronic absenteeism was 34% at Katherine Johnson and 29% at Arcade, both above district and state rates. These context measures are observations, not explanations of results, and only two years of test results are available.
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