Summary:
Berkeley School District 87 has two middle schools serving grades 6–8: Northlake Middle School and MacArthur Middle School, with enrollments of 378 and 357 students. In 2025–26, the schools’ average proficiency was 38% in ELA and 23% in math, compared with 56% and 40% statewide; eighth-grade science averaged 29%, versus 52% statewide. The most important area-wide finding is that both schools remain below state proficiency in every reported subject, with the largest average gap in eighth-grade science.
Northlake leads the overall comparison: it had 42% proficiency in ELA and 23% in math, compared with 35% and 22% at MacArthur; eighth-grade science was also slightly higher, 30% versus 28%. Northlake’s clearest advantage is in grades 7–8 ELA, where it leads by 13 and 12 percentage points. MacArthur’s exceptions are sixth-grade ELA, where it is ahead by 3 points, and seventh-grade math, where it leads by 6 points. The sharpest grade-level concern is MacArthur eighth-grade math: 10% are proficient, compared with 20% at Northlake and 35% statewide.
Scores rose at both schools from 2024–25 to 2025–26 in all three reported areas, but progress relative to the state was mixed: the schools’ average gaps narrowed by 1 point in ELA and math, while the science gap widened by 2 points. SchoolDigger ranks Northlake 969th of 1,126 schools (14th percentile, 1 star) and MacArthur 1,011th (10th percentile, 1 star). Both report a 12.3:1 student-teacher ratio. As context, in 2024–25, 84% of Northlake students and 76% of MacArthur students were free/reduced lunch eligible; this is an observation, not an explanation for results. The data cover only two testing years, so they show a year-to-year change rather than a long-term trend.
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