Parrish Elementarymiddle School, Parrish AL

Original Research by School Decision on Parrish Elementarymiddle School

Parrish Elementary Middle School serves students from prekindergarten through eighth grade in the small town of Parrish in Walker County, Alabama. The town itself grew as a railroad junction and coal-mining community, then saw its coal industry decline in the 1980s. Today Parrish is a quiet, close-knit rural town of modest size where daily life is car-dependent; the school sits within the town footprint alongside Town Hall and a senior center. The town’s population has been declining over recent census counts, and its high school was closed in the past several years due to budget constraints, sending older students to Oakman High or Cordova High.

The school is a regular public school within the Walker County district. Because it does not serve high school grades, there is no graduation rate to report. State testing results from the Alabama ACAP assessment for the 2024-25 school year are available and offer a mixed picture. In English language arts, students across grades show a generally stronger performance. Proficiency rates in the early elementary grades are solid, and even in the middle grades they remain at or above half of students meeting the standard, with a notable uptick in seventh grade. In mathematics, however, the pattern is more uneven. In grades three and five roughly half of students reached the proficiency mark, but in grades six through eight the shares drop sharply, settling well below that level. Science results, tested in fourth and eighth grades, show roughly a third to two-fifths of students proficient.

When the school’s overall proficiency across tested subjects and grades is compared against the districts in Walker County, it places below the midpoint. That comparison uses only two districts in the county (the Walker County district itself and likely the other district operating high schools), so the difference is narrow, but the school’s composite score sits at the lower end of that small group. A parent concerned about academic performance would want to look into this further, especially for mathematics instruction in the middle grades. Only one year of testing data is available here, so no trend can be examined.

Enrollment hovers around a moderate size for an elementary-middle school serving grades PK through 8, with a student body that is predominantly white, with smaller shares of Black and Hispanic students. A substantial majority of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, indicating concentrated economic need. Data on students with disabilities and English learners was not available, so those characteristics cannot be assessed from the provided information.

The district that runs this school, Walker County, recently approved a consolidation plan that closed four elementary schools, redirecting those students to remaining buildings for the 2024-25 school year. The district also expanded career technical education programs at its county center of technology, though those pathways are more relevant for high school students; Parrish students who move on to Oakman or Cordova high schools would have access to them. The district’s enrollment has been declining over time, which drove the consolidation effort.

Housing in Parrish is relatively affordable, with home values and rents well below national benchmarks, reflecting the town’s rural character and modest economic base. The local unemployment rate and median household income are in line with national averages, though the town’s own major employers are not well documented beyond historical coal and rail industries.

This school fits families who want a small, rural setting where the elementary and middle grades are combined in one building, so siblings attend the same school. The community is tight-knit, with a town hall and senior center as gathering points, and the school itself is a civic anchor. The academic picture, particularly in math at the middle level, would warrant a closer look, while the early-grade ELA results are a relative strength. Given the town’s population decline and the high school closure, families should also consider the longer path through high school, as students from Parrish attend schools in other parts of Walker County.

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Academic performance

How students perform on state tests, by grade, set against the district.

Math

Grade 350%

School 50% · District 45% · ▲ 5 pts above district

▲ 7 pts above state median · ▲ 1 pts above county median

Grade 435%

School 35% · District 42% · ▼ 6 pts below district

▼ 2 pts below state median · ▼ 12 pts below county median

Grade 550%

School 50% · District 32% · ▲ 18 pts above district

▲ 17 pts above state median · ▲ 8 pts above county median

Grade 620%

School 20% · District 28% · ▼ 8 pts below district

▼ 9 pts below state median

Grade 79%

School 9% · District 19% · ▼ 10 pts below district

▼ 8 pts below state median

Grade 811%

School 11% · District 18% · ▼ 7 pts below district

▼ 5 pts below state median · ▼ 5 pts below county median

English language arts

Grade 361%

School 61% · District 72% · ▼ 11 pts below district

▼ 5 pts below state median · ▼ 12 pts below county median

Grade 471%

School 71% · District 63% · ▲ 8 pts above district

▲ 12 pts above state median · ▲ 10 pts above county median

Grade 577%

School 77% · District 68% · ▲ 9 pts above district

▲ 11 pts above state median · ▲ 9 pts above county median

Grade 648%

School 48% · District 57% · ▼ 8 pts below district

▼ 7 pts below state median

Grade 767%

School 67% · District 61% · ▲ 6 pts above district

▲ 13 pts above state median

Grade 857%

School 57% · District 47% · ▲ 10 pts above district

▲ 5 pts above state median · ▲ 5 pts above county median

Science

Grade 444%

School 44% · District 50% · ▼ 6 pts below district

▲ 6 pts above state median

Grade 832%

School 32% · District 35% · ▼ 3 pts below district

▼ 3 pts below state median · ▼ 2 pts below county median

This schoolWalker County, same grade

Graduation rate (ACGR) reflects the federally published Adjusted Cohort Graduation Rate for the most recent year available. We refresh this data annually at the close of each academic year in June. The federal source publishes a banded rate (for example, "90-94%") instead of an exact number for cohorts small enough to risk identifying individual students. The state distribution chart, where shown, plots every school in the state with a published rate or band; schools whose rate is federally suppressed are excluded. Where the federal source publishes a band rather than an exact rate, the school is placed within its band using a stable, ID-derived offset, so its position is consistent across visits.