Summary:
ZIP code 55101 in downtown/Lowertown Saint Paul contains exactly one school — Creative Arts Secondary School — a public school in Saint Paul Public Schools that serves grades 6 through 12, so there are no other schools in this area to compare it against.
Because it's the only school here, the useful comparisons are against its district and the state. In 2025-2026, all-grades proficiency was 11.7% in math, 28.5% in reading and 9.3% in science, all below district and state averages. But those averages blend middle and high school students, and the two halves look very different. Math rises steadily by grade: 3.7% in grade 6, 7.8% in grade 7, 16.7% in grade 8 and 31.8% in grade 11, which beats the district's 23.1%. Reading follows the same pattern, climbing from 20.0% in grade 6 to 51.9% in grade 10 — the strongest figure for this school and above both the district (34.0%) and the state (42.5%). The weakest results are concentrated in the middle grades, especially grade 8 science at 2.9%.
The school has also improved markedly in state standings, moving from 402nd of 476 (1 star) in 2022-2023 to 352nd of 480 (1 star) in 2023-2024 and 210th of 473 (3 stars, 56th percentile) in 2025-2026 — now above its district's overall percentile. Math proficiency rose from 7.78% to 11.7% year over year, while science fell from 17.11% to 9.3% and reading was nearly flat. Graduation was 70.9%, below the district (77.8%) and state (84.9%), though the dropout rate of 3.2% was better than both. About 75.39% of students qualify for free or reduced lunch, and the student-teacher ratio is 18.3 to 1.
Thank you for your feedback!