Summary:
There are seven elementary schools in the 77021 zip code of Houston, Texas, serving grades from Pre-Kindergarten through 8th grade, all within a highly economically disadvantaged community where an average of 94.3% of students qualify for free or reduced lunch.
The standout school in this area is Thompson Elementary, which is the only school to earn a 4-star rating and outperforms both district and state averages in Reading and Mathematics despite a 95.87% economically disadvantaged rate. In contrast, Foster Elementary is the most challenged, with 100% economic disadvantage and consistently ranking in the bottom 6% of Texas elementary schools. The Beatrice Mayes Institute Charter School shows moderate performance with notable strengths in later grades, particularly in 8th-grade Social Studies where 58.33% of students were proficient compared to the state average of 31.69%. Other schools like Whidby Elementary, Peck Elementary, and Hartsfield Elementary fall in the middle range, while KIPP Peace Elementary ranks in the 3rd percentile statewide.
A critical finding is that high poverty does not preclude high performance, as Thompson Elementary proves. However, a universal "Science gap" exists across all schools, with 5th-grade Science proficiency averaging just 11.8% compared to the state average of 29.57%. The five Houston Independent School District (Isd) schools show dramatic performance variation, suggesting school-level leadership matters more than district policies. Spending per student does not directly correlate with performance, as the highest-spending school (Peck at $12,014) ranks in the 26th percentile, while the top-performing Thompson has mid-range spending of $11,521.
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