Demarest School District

Demarest School District has three schools serving prekindergarten through grade 8: County Road School (PK–1), Luther Lee Emerson School (grades 2–4), and Demarest Middle School (grades 5–8), with 801 students combined. County Road has no supplied proficiency results, and the other schools’ scores cover different grades, so the data cannot establish a fair school-to-school test-score ranking. The clearest finding is that every reported, grade-matched ELA and math result at the other two schools—and both reported science results at Demarest Middle—exceeds the corresponding state rate.

Demarest Middle School stands out for Algebra I: 100% were proficient on both its reported end-of-course and eighth-grade tests, compared with state rates of 40% and 75%, advantages of 60 and 26 points. Across the available grade results, math has the largest average advantage over the state: 30 points, compared with 23 in ELA and 24 in science. The lowest relative result is Demarest Middle’s grade 6 ELA score, at 63% versus 51% statewide, still 12 points higher. Luther Lee Emerson School also exceeds state rates in its reported grades 3–4 ELA and math results. Neither school can be called the overall “bottom” based on these scores.

Recent results are mixed but show overall declines in ELA and math: across the available grades, average ELA proficiency fell 9 points from 2024–2025 to 2025–2026, and math fell 3 points, while science rose 2 points. SchoolDigger rankings also moved down: Demarest Middle went from the 97th percentile and 5 stars to the 91st percentile and 5 stars; Luther Lee Emerson moved from the 95th percentile and 5 stars to the 89th percentile and 4 stars. In 2024–2025, student-teacher ratios were 10 at both schools with test results and 11.9 at County Road; free/reduced lunch eligible rates that year were 0.8%, 1.4%, and 1.8%, respectively. These are background observations, not explanations for achievement.