Woodville Elementary

Woodville Elementary is a small PK–5 school in Richmond, VA, serving 217 students in Richmond City Public Schools, where 98.6% of students qualify for free/reduced lunch. The school has ranked in the bottom 1% of Virginia elementary schools nearly every year since 2015-16, placing 1103rd out of 1111 schools in 2025-26 — a decade-long pattern of bottom-tier performance, not a one-year fluke.

Test scores at Woodville fall far below district and state averages in nearly every subject. For example, only 27.8% of 4th graders were proficient in math, compared to 54.9% districtwide and 73.3% statewide. In 4th grade Virginia Studies, just 16.7% of students were proficient — a 54-point gap behind the state average. Chronic absenteeism is also a major concern: 31.3% of students were chronically absent in 2024-25, roughly double the state rate, though it has improved from 44.9% in 2021-22. What makes this especially frustrating is that Woodville spends $18,722 per student — among the highest of nearby schools — and has the lowest student-teacher ratio in the area at 10.5 students per teacher, yet outcomes remain among the lowest in the state.

Comparisons with nearby schools show that poverty alone doesn't explain these results. Chimborazo Elementary, just 1.25 miles away, serves a nearly identical student population (99.5% free/reduced lunch) but has far better outcomes: 65.0% proficiency in 5th grade reading versus 33.3% at Woodville, and a chronic absenteeism rate half of Woodville's. Fairfield Court Elementary, only 0.27 miles away, also outperforms Woodville in 4th grade math and Virginia Studies despite similar demographics and attendance. There are some hopeful signs — 5th grade science jumped from 16.7% to 42.9% and 3rd grade reading improved from 23.1% to 37.8% in the latest year — but the school remains in urgent need of strategies that address attendance and instructional effectiveness, particularly for male students, who rank last in the state.