Summary:
ZIP code 87002 includes six elementary schools serving about 1,789 students in Belen Consolidated Schools, with grade spans of PK–6 at La Merced Elementary, Gil Sanchez Elementary, Dennis Chavez Elementary, and La Promesa Elementary, PK–3 at Rio Grande Elementary, and 1–8 at Belen Family School. All six report 100% free/reduced lunch, so poverty is uniform across the area even though results vary widely.
Dennis Chavez Elementary is the academic standout, with 63.53% proficiency in English language arts and 50.59% in math — well above the district and state — and a 2025–26 rank of 42nd of 346 schools (4 stars). Belen Family School is close behind at 57.94% ELA and 43.93% math, ranking 71st of 346 (4 stars), despite the largest class sizes in the group. Gil Sanchez Elementary is also above district and state averages in both subjects (3 stars). By contrast, La Merced Elementary and La Promesa Elementary score below district and state in ELA and math, with La Merced at 40.77% ELA and 21.62% math and La Promesa at 37.72% and 22.81%.
The gap within this single zip code is large: the top two schools average about 21 points higher in ELA and 25 points higher in math than the bottom two. Math is consistently weaker than ELA everywhere, and science is concentrated at the top — Dennis Chavez and Belen Family are the only schools clearly above the state science average, while La Merced's 5th-grade science is just 13.56% and La Promesa's science results are suppressed. Grade-level results vary sharply within schools, and student-teacher ratios do not predict performance: Belen Family has the highest ratio at 29.0 yet strong results, while Rio Grande has the lowest at 11.6. Rank trends show Dennis Chavez rising and La Promesa improving, while Gil Sanchez, Belen Family, and La Merced have slipped. Because the state suppresses some figures, several results — especially La Promesa's science and math — remain unknown rather than weak.
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