Summary
Sumner Elementary is a K-5 school in Greensboro, North Carolina, serving 549 students in Guilford County Schools, where 99.45% of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch. After spending most of the past decade in the bottom quarter of North Carolina elementary schools, Sumner’s newest state rating is its strongest in ten years: the school now ranks at the 32nd percentile statewide and has earned a 2-star rating for the first time in the available ten-year trend.
The academic picture is mixed but improving. Fourth graders are performing at or slightly above district averages in reading (54.5% vs. 53.2%) and math (56.8% vs. 57.0%), while fifth graders made big one-year gains, especially in science, where proficiency jumped from 32.7% to 58.2%. Third grade remains a weak spot: 3rd-grade math fell to 51.8%, about 15 points below the state average. Attendance is another clear challenge. Sumner’s chronic absenteeism rate has dropped from 42.3% to 32.6%, but it remains above the district rate of 29.2% and the state rate of 24.2%. Nearby Millis Road Elementary, with nearly identical poverty levels, posts a chronic absenteeism rate of only 10.5%.
Compared with schools in its immediate area, Sumner now sits in the lower-middle tier. Several neighboring schools rank lower, including Cyrus P Frazier Elementary, Sedgefield Elementary, Julius I Foust Elementary, and Next Generation Academy; others, such as Millis Road Elementary, Pleasant Garden Elementary, Edwin A Alderman Elementary, and Southern Elementary, rank in the 51st to 63rd percentile. Because all of these schools serve similarly high-poverty populations, the differences in performance cannot be explained by poverty alone. One internal gap stands out: girls score at the 52nd percentile statewide, while boys remain at the 19th percentile. Special education students also warrant attention, ranking at the 21st percentile in the most recent available data. For parents, Sumner’s story is one of real progress, with attendance and support for boys and special education students as the key areas to watch.
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