Summary:
ZIP code 96776 has just one public school, so instead of comparing schools side by side, this is a detailed profile of a single campus: Paauilo Elementary & Intermediate School, part of the Hawaii Department of Education. It serves grades PK through 9 and enrolled 180 students in 2024–2025, with a student–teacher ratio of 12 to 1 — about 15 teachers. The data file labels the school as an "Alternative" school and therefore reports zero elementary, middle, and high schools for the ZIP code, even though the school clearly covers elementary and intermediate grades. Parents should treat that label as a possible classification quirk rather than a description of the program.
Academically, the school performs solidly. In 2024–2025, 52% of students were proficient in English language arts, 54% in math, and 53% in science — a tight band of just 2 points across the three subjects, suggesting fairly even instruction. The most important change is what happened next: ELA dipped only 2 points to 50%, but math fell 9 points to 45% and science fell 8 points to 45%. Math went from the strongest subject to the weakest, now trailing ELA by 5 points. That subject-specific drop in math and science is the item to watch in the next reporting cycle.
Two context numbers stand out. First, 66.67% of students — roughly 120 of 180 — qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, yet about half are still proficient, which is a genuinely strong result for a school with that level of economic need. Second, 28% of students — about 50, or one in four — are chronically absent, which is the clearest area for improvement. The school also reports $19,693 in per-student spending, but that figure is from 2018–2019, roughly six years older than every other metric, so it should be read as a sign of a well-resourced small school rather than a current budget number.
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