Rea Farms STEAM Academy

Rea Farms STEAM Academy is a K-8 school in the southeast Charlotte area that serves about 1,098 students and belongs to the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools district; the school has earned a 5-star SchoolDigger rating for six consecutive years and currently ranks 29th of roughly 1,500 North Carolina schools. Every tested grade and subject exceeds 80% proficiency, with 3rd grade math at 98%, 8th grade math at 91.7%, and 8th grade science at 91.7%. Those results run 25 to more than 35 percentage points above the average for the district.

Rea Farms is not an isolated success — it sits within a remarkable cluster of high-performing nearby schools that includes Providence Spring Elementary, Polo Ridge Elementary, Hawk Ridge Elementary, and Rea View Elementary, all ranked in the top 25 statewide. Rea Farms' 29th-place state ranking puts it squarely inside that elite group. What makes the school distinctive is its K-8 structure, since most of its neighbors end at 5th grade. Rea Farms shows none of the typical middle-school drop-off: its 8th grade math and science proficiency (91.7% each) and 8th grade reading (87.1%) are exceptional by any standard.

The school also posts outstanding attendance: chronic absenteeism is 7.1%, versus 26.8% districtwide and 24.2% statewide, and the rate has declined steadily for four straight years. Low-income students at Rea Farms rank in the 92nd percentile among comparable groups statewide, and English learners rank 9th out of 519 such groups in North Carolina — evidence that the school serves a broad range of learners effectively. The only metric worth monitoring is the gifted/talented subgroup, which dipped to the 68th percentile in the latest year after sitting at the 97th percentile the year before. Overall, Rea Farms delivers exceptional academics from kindergarten through 8th grade in one consistent, high-performing setting.