Dr Joseph F Pollack Academic Center of Excellence

Dr Joseph F Pollack Academic Center of Excellence is a K-8 public school academy in Southfield, MI, serving 520 students as its own district, where over 82% of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch.

Pollack is currently performing in the bottom quartile of elementary schools statewide, ranking in the 9th percentile for the 2025-2026 school year—a decline from the 16th percentile the year before. Proficiency rates are well below state averages across nearly all subjects and grades. For example, only 16% of 6th graders were proficient in ELA (state: 37.5%) and just 6% in math (state: 31.9%). The most pressing issue is chronic absenteeism: 49% of students were chronically absent in 2024-2025, nearly double the state average of 27.9%. This directly hampers academic progress. The school spends $13,021 per student, which is higher than nearby Laurus Academy ($12,771), yet Laurus achieves far better outcomes. There is one bright spot: 7th-grade ELA proficiency reached 43.8% in 2023-2024, above the state average, suggesting some grade-level teams are more effective than others.

Comparing Pollack to nearby schools reveals stark contrasts. Norup International School, just 2 miles away in the Berkley School District, has only 18.2% chronic absenteeism and a 20.68% free/reduced lunch population, with proficiency rates 2-3 times higher (e.g., 70.4% vs. 16% in 6th-grade ELA). However, Pembroke Academy, a charter school just over 2 miles away, serves a similar socioeconomic population (84.62% free/reduced lunch) yet ranks in the 92nd percentile statewide, with proficiency rates above state averages in most subjects. This shows that high poverty does not have to dictate low achievement. While Pollack’s overall performance is low, its African American students rank in the 26th percentile statewide—higher than the school’s overall 9th percentile—indicating a less pronounced achievement gap for this subgroup than at many other schools.