Maple Creek Elementary, CA

Original Research by School Decision on Maple Creek Elementary

Maple Creek Elementary is a single-school K-8 district in distant rural Humboldt County serving a very small student population in a extremely isolated setting. The district's defining characteristic is its scale: enrollment is tiny, with just a handful of students across all grade levels and roughly one full-time teacher, creating a student-teacher ratio around 4 to 1. This level of personalization in instruction is the primary draw for families in this setting, but it comes with real structural constraints.

State assessment data from the 2024-25 school year for math, English language arts, and science are all suppressed by the state, which happens when enrollment is too small to report numbers publicly. This suppression reflects the district's size rather than hidden academic performance, but it does mean parents cannot see standardized proficiency outcomes. The most recent publicly available state test results date to 2012-13 for social studies, far too old to offer any meaningful picture of current instruction or student learning.

The district's immediate challenge is existential. In January 2024, the school board held a public hearing on a lapsation deferment waiver, a term tied to California's law allowing the state to dissolve a school district if its average daily attendance falls below a very low threshold. That the district sought such a waiver signals ongoing enrollment fragility. Families considering a move into the district should understand this clearly: if enrollment drops further, the state could dissolve the district and annex its territory to an adjoining district, displacing students mid-year. This is not speculation; it is a formal legal process that small California districts face when they fall below minimum size thresholds. A parent may want to look into the current enrollment stability and the district's long-term sustainability plans directly with the school before committing to the area.

The community is in Korbel, a distant rural locale in Humboldt County. Housing values in the district's zip codes average in the mid-range for the county, with recent year-over-year price changes showing modest decline. Median household income across the state is in the mid-range, and rental costs are moderate relative to income, though mortgage costs are substantial relative to household earnings.

Among Humboldt County's districts, Maple Creek Elementary sits in the bottom quartile for chronic absenteeism, with a reported rate of 100 percent. This likely reflects the data suppression issue tied to tiny enrollment; the metric may not be meaningful when applied to so few students. Per-pupil spending is in the upper range among county districts, a consequence of fixed costs spread across very few students rather than a sign of resource abundance.

Any family considering this district should frame the decision around the tradeoff between extreme personalization and isolation on one hand, and program breadth, peer exposure, and institutional stability on the other. The school exists but its survival is not guaranteed.

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District Context

Officially reported figures, 2024-25.

Enrollment

Grades

KG–08

Schools

Student body

White 67%

Am. Indian / AK Native 33%

Schools in this District

1 schools are officially reported under this district.

Maple Creek Elementary

Housing & Real Estate

Data as of April 2026 | District-weighted from constituent ZIP codes

Home Values

Typical home value$561,228

Year-over-year change-9.6%

Range across 2 ZIP codes$489K to $561K

vs. state typical0.72x

vs. national typical1.52x

Home value trend (12 months)

ZIP code home values (2 ZIP codes)

ZIP	City	Value	YoY	Weight
95549	Kneeland	$561K	-9.6%	1.4%
95521	Arcata	$489K	-4.3%	0.0%

Rental Market

Typical monthly rent$1,549/mo

Rent trend (12 months)

ZIP code rents (1 ZIP codes)

ZIP	City	Rent/mo	YoY	Weight
95521	Arcata	$1,549	+1.8%	0.0%

Affordability

Est. monthly mortgage (20% down at 6.48%)$2,832/mo

Home price / national median income6.7x

Annual rent / national median income22.2%

Est. mortgage exceeds rent by$1,283/mo

Comparison

State typical home value$776,233 (-1.1% YoY)

National typical home value$368,198 (+0.6% YoY)

State ZHVI trend (12 months)

National ZHVI trend (12 months)

Economic Context

30-year fixed mortgage rate6.48%

National unemployment rate4.3%

National median household income$83,730

CPI: Rent of shelter (index)447.05

30-year fixed mortgage rate (12 months)

National unemployment rate (12 months)

National median household income (12 months)

CPI: Rent of shelter (index) (12 months)

Sources: Zillow Home Value Index and Zillow Observed Rent Index (Zillow Group), Realtor.com via Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (FRED)

Data Currently Unavailable

Academic Performance
Civil Rights Data (CRDC)

This profile is derived exclusively from publicly available federal and state datasets. It may not reflect the most current information available. We encourage parents and families to supplement this data with information published directly on the school’s website, which may include more recent figures, additional programs, or updated enrollment data.