Harper Elementary School

Harper Elementary School serves 366 students in grades K–4 in Wilmette, a North Shore Chicago suburb. In 2025–26, 80% of students were proficient in English Language Arts (ELA) and 76% in math—well above Illinois rates of 56% and 40%. The school’s results were below the overall results for Wilmette School District 39, at 87% in ELA and 78% in math. The central takeaway is that Harper performs well above the state, but trails its district and many nearby high-performing schools.

Harper’s results are close to the average for 10 nearby schools with comparable all-grade scores, but below their medians: 80% versus 86% in ELA, and 76% versus 82% in math. It also trails the three nearby Wilmette schools’ average results of 89% in ELA and 87% in math. Fourth-grade math is a particular relative weakness: Harper’s 71% was 11 points below the district’s result, though still 29 points above the state rate. Attendance is a notable positive: chronic absenteeism was 3%, matching the lowest rate reported among nearby schools and below the district’s 5% and state’s 24%.

Results have improved over three years, especially in math: ELA rose 5 points from 2023–24 to 2025–26, while math rose 17 points. Over that period, Harper’s advantage over the state narrowed by 11 points in ELA and widened by 5 points in math. SchoolDigger ranks Harper 119th of 1,737 statewide, at the 93rd percentile with 5 stars. Its student-teacher ratio was 12.2 in 2024–25, above the nearby-school median of 11.2. The school’s free/reduced lunch eligible rate was 1% in 2021–22. SchoolDigger’s ranking for special education students was at the 83rd percentile in 2025–26, down 16 points from 99 the prior year and below Harper’s overall 93rd percentile; this is a measure of the school’s standing in serving that group. Because Harper serves K–4 and subgroup comparison pools vary by year, older-grade comparisons and the subgroup ranking change warrant caution.