Best Public Schools in Zip Code 45403

ZIP code 45403, on Dayton's east side, is home to three schools serving roughly 984 students combined: Kemp Elementary School (PK–6, 422 students) and Wright Brothers Middle School (7–8, 374 students), both part of Dayton City, plus Horizon Science Academy Dayton Downtown, a K–8 charter of 188 students that operates as its own district. The two Dayton City schools form a feeder pattern in the same neighborhood, while the charter stands alone and has no outside district benchmark for attendance or spending. Data coverage is uneven: most outcomes are from 2025–26, but per-student spending is from 2018–19, and free/reduced lunch data is blank for all three.

Kemp is the standout for attendance and literacy, with chronic absenteeism of 19.4% against a district rate of 43.8%, and reading proficiency above the district in 5 of 8 grade-level comparisons. It is also the only school here to have earned any stars. Wright Brothers is the weakest: it ranks in the 2nd percentile of Ohio middle schools and posts the ZIP's lowest result, 8th-grade math at 1.4% proficient. Horizon is the most volatile: its 5th-grade reading result of 59.1% is the closest any school here comes to the state average of 70.4%, but it also records three exact zeros (8th-grade science, and 3rd- and 8th-grade math) and the highest absenteeism at 59.3%. No values in this data are suppressed, so those zeros are real reported zeros rather than privacy placeholders.

Across all 58 reported grade and subject results, not one meets the state average. Reading outperforms math at every school in both years. Attendance does not track class size: Kemp has the largest classes (21.1 students per teacher) yet by far the best attendance, while the two schools with smaller ratios have absenteeism nearly three times higher. Kemp's statewide percentile has slipped from 21st to 14th to 9th, even as its attendance shines. Horizon's year-to-year swings suggest very small cohorts of about 20 students, so single results there should be read cautiously. All three schools sit in the bottom decile of Ohio.