Summary:
The Portsmouth School District includes four elementary-level programs serving children from preschool through fifth grade in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Three schools—Mary C. Dondero Elementary School, Little Harbour School, and New Franklin School—serve grades K–5 and provide state assessment results. Together, they enroll 900 students and rank among New Hampshire’s top elementary schools. The smaller PEEP School - Pre School Program serves 24 students in pre-K through kindergarten and should be considered separately because it does not have comparable assessment or ranking data.
Overall, the three K–5 schools are exceptionally strong, with each ranked between 10th and 12th among 230 New Hampshire elementary schools. New Franklin School has the highest current ranking and strongest overall reading result, with 85% of students proficient. It also leads in third- and fourth-grade reading and fourth-grade math. Little Harbour School is the mathematics leader, with 84% proficiency overall, and has the strongest fifth-grade reading result at 91%. Mary C. Dondero Elementary School offers the strongest science performance, with 70% proficiency, while also showing consistently high mathematics and reading results.
For families comparing schools, mathematics is the clearest shared strength: the three K–5 schools average 81% proficiency, well above both the district and state averages. Upper-grade results are particularly impressive, including an average of 88% in fourth-grade math and 87% in fifth-grade reading. Science is more uneven, with Mary C. Dondero Elementary School substantially ahead of the other two schools. Reading declined somewhat year over year at all three schools, and third-grade reading and fifth-grade math show the greatest variation. Student-teacher ratios are low across the K–5 schools, ranging from 8.5 to 9.5, while PEEP School - Pre School Program has a notably smaller ratio of 4.0.
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