Summary:
Zip code 25209 is home to just one school, Whitesville Elementary School, a small rural school in Whitesville, WV, serving grades PK through 5 with an enrollment of 100 students.
As the only school in the area, Whitesville Elementary is the sole option for families, and it faces significant academic challenges. The school's performance has been declining, with its ranking dropping from 315th in 2023-2024 to 350th out of 355 schools in 2025-2026, and it has lost its 1-star rating. Proficiency rates are well below state averages across all subjects. In the most recent school year, only 25.6% of students were proficient in math and 23.1% in English Language Arts, compared to state averages of 39.4% and 47.6%, respectively. The most alarming statistic is in 3rd-grade ELA, where just 8.3% of students are proficient—a 36.3 percentage point gap from the state average. Performance varies by grade, with 5th graders showing the strongest results (33.3% in both math and ELA) and 4th graders struggling most in math (20% proficiency).
Despite these struggles, the school does have some operational advantages. It maintains a favorable 10:1 student-teacher ratio and spends a substantial $14,648 per student, which is above average. However, these resources have not translated into academic success, suggesting that challenges may stem from factors beyond funding, such as rural isolation or limited support services. The school also performs below its already low-performing district, Boone County Schools, which ranks 44th out of 54 districts in West Virginia. With such a small student body, individual grade cohorts are tiny (likely 15-20 students), meaning a few students can dramatically swing proficiency percentages. For parents, this means the school offers small class sizes and dedicated funding, but families should be aware of the declining academic trends and the urgent need for targeted reading interventions, particularly in the early grades.
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