A+ Arts Academy

A+ Arts Academy is the single school in the A+ Arts Academy district — a K–8 building at 1395 Fair Ave in Columbus, Ohio, serving 247 students. Although it is classified as an Elementary school type, it enrolls children in grades K through 8, which means families here can keep a child in the same building for up to nine years. Because there is only one school in this area, there is no sibling school to compare against; instead, the most useful comparisons are to Ohio state averages, which accompany every test score in the data.

The headline is that this school ranks at the very bottom of Ohio. The district ranks 769th of 773 Ohio districts — the 1st percentile — and the school ranked 1,516th of 1,560 in 2025-26, the 3rd percentile, with zero stars in each of the last three years. The percentile has drifted down from 5 to 3 over that span, so the relative position is not improving. Not one of the 14 reported subject-and-grade test results meets the state average. Overall proficiency sits around 11.4% against a state figure near 60.1%. The sharpest concern is 8th grade, where math, English language arts, and science each came in at 0% proficient in both years tested, compared with state averages in the 52–61% range.

Two other numbers stand out for parents. Chronic absenteeism is 84.4% — roughly five of every six students — which makes consistent instruction very difficult, though only one year of attendance data is provided. Meanwhile, the student–teacher ratio is 8.8, unusually low, suggesting small classes alone have not translated into proficiency. There is some encouraging movement: English language arts rose about 5.3 points year over year, with 5th grade ELA up 20.6 points, while math improved about 1.4 points and science slipped slightly. Keep in mind that with cohorts of roughly 25–30 students per grade, a single child can shift a proficiency rate by several points.