Best Elementary Schools in Zip Code 83629

Zip code 83629 is served by a single elementary school, Horseshoe Bend Elementary, which enrolls just 84 students in grades PK–5 and operates within the Horseshoe Bend School District. As the only school in the area, comparisons are made against district and state averages rather than peer schools, and this small, majority-low-income school (58.33% free/reduced lunch) holds its own in several key areas.

Horseshoe Bend Elementary’s strongest subject is math, with 45.0% of students proficient on the ISAT—well above the district’s 30.2% and also slightly above the state average of 43.1%. English language arts proficiency sits at 47.5%, which is far better than the district’s 38.4% but still about 6.5 points below the state (54.0%). That ELA figure represents a dramatic improvement from the prior year, when only 30.8% of students were proficient, a jump of 16.7 percentage points. Grade-level results show a mixed picture: 3rd grade ELA (50%) matches the district and edges out the state (48.5%), while 4th grade ELA (44.4%) and 5th grade ELA (50%) trail their state counterparts. Chronic absenteeism is another bright spot, at 13.9%—nearly identical to the state’s 13.8% and much better than the district’s 16.5%.

The school’s state ranking has been stable for over a decade, currently sitting at 218 out of 346 schools (37th percentile) with a 2-star rating, down from a 62nd-percentile ranking in 2011–2012. Per-student spending of $12,803 comes from 2018–2019 data and may not reflect current budgets. The student-teacher ratio of 13.2:1 supports a personalized learning environment, but because enrollments are so small, year-to-year test scores can fluctuate considerably—so the ELA surge should be viewed with some caution. Overall, Horseshoe Bend Elementary is a small, high-poverty school that outperforms its district in both tested subjects, shows strong math results relative to the state, and has made meaningful progress in reading, though sustaining that growth and closing the remaining state gap remains the key challenge.