Summary:
Gardner, Illinois, has two public schools serving prekindergarten through grade 8 and grades 9–12, with enrollments of 146 at Gardner Elementary School and 154 at Gardner-South Wilmington Township High School. Their results show different strengths: the elementary school is above the state in all-grades ELA but below it in math, while the high school is above the state in math and trails in most ELA and science comparisons. The clearest takeaway is that math is a relative high-school strength, while elementary math and high-school ELA and science are the main academic concerns.
Gardner Elementary School stands out for upper-grade ELA: eighth grade reached 86%, compared with 63% statewide, a 23-point advantage; sixth grade was 65% versus 59%, a 6-point lead. Its all-grades ELA result was 58%, 2 points above the state, but all-grades math was 35%, 4 points below. At the high school, math was above the state in grades 9, 10 and 11 by 10, 4 and 1 point, respectively. By contrast, 11th-grade ACT science was 33% versus 48% statewide, and ELA was 36% versus 50%. The high school’s 100% graduation rate was 10 points above the state rate.
Results changed unevenly: the high school’s state-relative results weakened in eight of nine matched comparisons from 2024–2025 to 2025–2026, although ninth-grade ELA and math improved; ninth-grade math rose to 53%, 10 points above the state. Elementary ELA’s state advantage narrowed from 6 points to 2, while math shifted from 3 points above the state to 4 below. SchoolDigger’s high-school ranking percentile fell from 67 to 50 between 2024–2025 and 2025–2026; the elementary school’s latest ranking, for 2024–2025, was 57, up 2 points from 2022–2023. In 2024–2025, free/reduced lunch eligible students made up 51% at the elementary school and 30% at the high school. Student-teacher ratios were 9.1 and 8.5; chronic absenteeism was 14% and 18%, both below the state’s 24%.
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