Summary:
Ilwaco, a small coastal city in southwest Washington, has two listed public schools serving grades 6–12: Ilwaco High School for grades 9–12 and Hilltop Elementary School, which serves grades 6–8 despite its name. Together, they enroll 485 students, and both are part of the Ocean Beach School District. No elementary school serving grades below 6 is listed for the city.
Ilwaco High School is the stronger-performing school overall. In 2025–2026, 76.12% of students were proficient in English language arts, well above both the district and state rates. Science proficiency was 52.24%, slightly above the state, while math was much weaker at 23.88%. The high school also reported an 89% graduation rate for 2024–2025, above the statewide rate of 82.6%. Its ranking improved substantially over three years, moving from the 24th to the 65th percentile. These results suggest meaningful recent progress, although reporting years and ranking methods vary.
Hilltop Elementary School has smaller classes by the reported student-teacher ratio—15.9 students per teacher compared with 19.8 at the high school—and science proficiency rose nearly 16 percentage points in the latest year. However, its 2025–2026 proficiency rates were lower than the high school’s in every subject: 31.79% in English language arts, 17.34% in math, and 43.10% in science. Math is the largest shared concern across the area, with both schools far below the state average. Parents may also want to note that Hilltop’s ranking remains low despite a modest recent improvement, while the district overall ranks in the 27th percentile statewide.
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