Best Elementary Schools in Zip Code 70805

This analysis examines five elementary schools in the 70805 zip code of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, serving grades PK-8 within the East Baton Rouge Parish district and charter networks, an area where all schools report over 94% of students qualifying for free or reduced lunch.

Inspire Charter Academy is the clear standout, earning a 2-star rating and ranking in the 29th-39th percentile statewide, while the other ranked schools—Claiborne Elementary School, Prescott K-8 Academy, and Winbourne Elementary School—all languish in the bottom 8th percentile. Inspire’s test scores in math and English language arts often approach or exceed district averages, and it is the only school with a dropout rate (4.5%) below the district average. In contrast, Prescott K-8 Academy faces the most severe challenges, with a 60% chronic absenteeism rate—nearly three times the state average—and the lowest test scores in the area, including single-digit social studies proficiency for 3rd graders. Dalton Elementary School A Redesign School is a data void, providing no rankings, test scores, or absenteeism data, making its performance impossible to assess.

Chronic absenteeism is a systemic crisis, averaging 50.3% across the three schools with data, more than double the state average of 22.5%. Social studies proficiency is a universal weakness, with even Inspire lagging at 48% compared to its math (56%) and ELA (61%) scores. The student-teacher ratio at Inspire (121.4:1) appears to be a data error, while the other four schools average a reasonable 12.4:1. Overall, while Inspire demonstrates that strong school-level factors can overcome poverty to some degree, the majority of schools in this zip code are in urgent need of interventions to address absenteeism and academic performance.