Summary:
ZIP code 28034 in Dallas, North Carolina is home to two PK-5 elementary schools—Carr Elementary and Costner Elementary—both part of Gaston County Schools, a district ranked in the 41st percentile statewide, where each school serves a student population with more than 99% of students eligible for free or reduced-price lunch.
In the latest data cycle, Carr Elementary has emerged as the academic leader. Carr's overall EOG proficiency average is 57.2% compared to Costner Elementary's 51.9%, and it ranks #814 in North Carolina versus Costner's #1,033. This marks a sharp reversal from the prior year, when Costner was the stronger school in 6 of 7 EOG categories. Carr improved by roughly 9.7 percentage points in one year while Costner's scores stayed essentially flat. Carr is above the district in 5 of 7 EOG categories, with particular strength in math—its three-grade math average of 61.8% proficiency approaches the state average. The single biggest swing came in 5th-grade science, where Carr jumped from 40.4% to 66.9% proficiency in one year, nearly matching the state average of 67.7%. Costner, meanwhile, lacks Carr's momentum and does not outperform the state in any reported category, though it remains competitive in 4th-grade reading and 5th-grade math.
On non-test measures, Costner Elementary actually holds the advantage: its chronic absenteeism rate is just 14.2% versus Carr's 19.2%, its student-teacher ratio is lower at 14.1 compared to Carr's 16.9, and it reports higher per-student spending at $9,693 versus Carr's $8,907. Both schools outperform district and state averages on chronic absenteeism, which is a positive finding given their high-poverty populations. However, reading remains a shared weakness—neither school reaches 50% proficiency in 5th-grade reading, and both trail the state's 55.3% average, making upper-elementary reading the clearest opportunity for improvement in this area.
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