Gibbs Magnet Elementary School, Little Rock AR

Original Research by School Decision on Gibbs Magnet Elementary School

Gibbs Magnet Elementary School serves students from prekindergarten through fifth grade in the Little Rock School District, a setting that blends a public magnet identity with the broader context of Arkansas’s capital city. The school is a small elementary, with enrollment distributed fairly evenly across the grade levels from kindergarten up. More than half of the students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, which signals a school community with a substantial share of families navigating economic pressure. By race and ethnicity, the student body is predominantly Black, with a sizable White minority and smaller shares of Hispanic and Asian students.

On the 2024-25 state assessments, Gibbs Magnet posted proficiency rates that, when averaged across tested grades and subjects, place it in the top tier of elementary schools in Pulaski County. That is a noteworthy position given the full set of county districts. The picture within the building, however, has some variation a parent would want to examine more closely. In English language arts, fourth graders met the proficiency bar at a solid rate, while third and fifth graders performed lower. In math, the pattern shifted: third graders had the lowest proficiency rate of any tested grade, while fourth and fifth graders cleared half of students reaching the bar. Science results were the softest area overall, with proficiency declining from third grade through fifth grade. The trend across grades suggests that the school’s strongest showing is in the middle elementary years, with some softening on the way in and the way out.

The state testing data is the main academic information available here. There is no reported chronic absenteeism rate, no graduation rate (the school does not serve high school grades), and no information on staffing, discipline, or course access. A parent interested in the daily environment or the school’s approach to student support would need to follow up directly with the school or district for those details. The district brief, which searched for recent changes such as bond elections, curriculum shifts, or school closures, returned no confirmed findings, so there is no recent district-level turbulence reported in the public record for this period.

The housing market in the school’s zip code is moderate relative to national benchmarks. Home values and rents are below the state average, though housing costs have been rising modestly. The estimated monthly mortgage and rent figures suggest that homeownership is a somewhat heavier financial lift than renting, though the differential is not extreme. For a family considering a move into this attendance area, the affordability picture is more accessible than many parts of the country, though it reflects the economic reality of a district where a majority of students qualify for meal assistance.

Little Rock itself is the state’s capital and largest city, with a diversified economy anchored by healthcare, banking, and government. The city has a walkable downtown core and a notable network of parks and trails. The broader metro area has seen modest population growth. What this means for Gibbs Magnet is a school that draws from a neighborhood within a city with strong civic institutions and a mix of professional and service-sector employment, but also with the economic stratification that comes with an urban district.

Gibbs Magnet offers a focused elementary experience in a magnet setting, with academic outcomes that on the whole are strong compared to other elementary schools in the same county. The proficiency data shows a school that performs well above many of its peers, but with a few grade-level and subject soft spots, especially in science and in third-grade math. A family looking at this school should weigh its solid countywide standing against the uneven results by grade and subject, and should seek additional information on student support and classroom environment to fill in the picture that the available data leaves incomplete.

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Academic performance

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

Math

Grade 342%

School 42% · District 30% · ▲ 12 pts above district

▲ 5 pts above state median · ▲ 22 pts above county median

Grade 452%

School 52% · District 33% · ▲ 20 pts above district

▲ 13 pts above state median · ▲ 32 pts above county median

Grade 551%

School 51% · District 30% · ▲ 21 pts above district

▲ 18 pts above state median · ▲ 31 pts above county median

English language arts

Grade 352%

School 52% · District 28% · ▲ 24 pts above district

▲ 19 pts above state median · ▲ 30 pts above county median

Grade 463%

School 63% · District 33% · ▲ 30 pts above district

▲ 27 pts above state median · ▲ 38 pts above county median

Grade 549%

School 49% · District 29% · ▲ 20 pts above district

▲ 16 pts above state median · ▲ 25 pts above county median

Science

Grade 346%

School 46% · District 28% · ▲ 18 pts above district

▲ 9 pts above state median · ▲ 22 pts above county median

Grade 441%

School 41% · District 32% · ▲ 10 pts above district

▲ 5 pts above state median · ▲ 18 pts above county median

Grade 539%

School 39% · District 26% · ▲ 13 pts above district

▲ 6 pts above state median · ▲ 19 pts above county median

This schoolLITTLE ROCK SCHOOL DISTRICT, 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.

Proficiency by household income

English language arts

Grade 3Lower-income50%Higher-income50%0 pp gap

Grade 4Lower-income42%Higher-income71%28 pp gap

Grade 5Lower-income16%Higher-income69%53 pp gap

Mathematics

Grade 3Lower-income21%Higher-income41%20 pp gap

Grade 4Lower-income39%Higher-income65%26 pp gap

Grade 5Lower-income26%Higher-income63%37 pp gap