Summary:
In zip code 21755, there is one elementary school, Valley Elementary, serving grades PK through 5 with 525 students in Jefferson, MD, part of the highly-rated Frederick County Public Schools district.
Valley Elementary is a school of contrasts, excelling in math and science while facing challenges in English Language Arts (ELA). In the 2025-2026 school year, its math proficiency rate of 41.2% significantly outpaced both the district (38.5%) and state (27.1%), and its 5th-grade science scores (43.2% proficient) also led the district and state. However, the school's ELA proficiency of 54.8% fell 9.2 percentage points below the district average of 64.0%, a gap seen across all tested grades. A notable grade-level anomaly appears in 4th-grade math, where proficiency drops sharply to 30%, compared to 53.3% in 3rd grade and 41.4% in 5th grade. Despite these strong scores in some areas, the school's state ranking has declined over three years, from the 77th percentile to the 67th percentile, causing its star rating to drop from 4 to 3 stars.
On a positive note, Valley Elementary has a lower chronic absenteeism rate (13.9%) than the district average (16.7%), which supports student engagement. The school also has a free/reduced lunch rate of 30.86% and a student-teacher ratio of 16.5:1, with per-student spending at $15,468. For parents, the key takeaway is that Valley offers strong math and science instruction but may require additional support for reading and writing, particularly given the declining overall ranking and the specific 4th-grade math dip.
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