Glen Speck Elementary, Paso Robles CA

Original Research by School Decision on Glen Speck Elementary

Glen Speck Elementary serves the lower grades, kindergarten through fifth, in Paso Robles, a wine-country city blending a walkable downtown core with residential neighborhoods and surrounding agricultural land. The school sits within Paso Robles Joint Unified, which recently reorganized its elementary structure. Starting in 2024-25, the district moved all elementary campuses from a K-5 to a K-6configuration, and Speck follows that model. The Georgia Brown Dual Immersion program, the district's largest elementary program, moved to its own K-8 campus as part of that shift, resolving years of delay tied to a geologic issue at the original site.

Speck's enrollment is small, concentrated in the early grades. The student body reflects the city's demographics: a substantial majority are Hispanic students, with a significant share identifying as white or multiracial, and smaller numbers of students from other backgrounds. An unusually large share of the student population qualifies for free or reduced-price lunch, indicating that families served are predominantly lower-income.

On California's state assessments in 2024-25, Speck's academic results are weak across both tested subjects and all tested grades. In English language arts, proficiency is low in the lower grades but improves markedly in the upper grades, with sixth-graders showing proficiency at a much higher rate than their younger peers. Math proficiency is consistently low across all grade levels tested. Science, assessed only in fifth grade, also shows low proficiency. Across both subjects, Speck's overall proficiency index sits in the bottom quartile when compared to districts in San Luis Obispo County. Only one year of test data is available, so trend information is not yet present.

The school's results suggest students are struggling with grade-level content in math and lower elementary reading, though the sharp gain in sixth-grade reading points to some success later in the elementary band. A parent may want to look into further with the school whether reading intervention is happening in the primary grades and how the upper-grade literacy gains are being achieved.

Housing costs in Paso Robles are moderate for the region but remain substantial. Home values and rental costs are stable, though rents have declined slightly in the past year. A household would need income at a moderate-to-upper level to afford a home in the area without paying a large share of income to the mortgage, and monthly rent takes up a material portion of a typical household budget. The wider district is planning a new general obligation bond for the November ballot to fund classroom modernization and career technical education expansion, which if passed would raise property taxes for homeowners, adding a financial layer to any family considering the area.

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Academic performance

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

Math

Grade 317%

School 17% · District 33% · ▼ 16 pts below district

▼ 26 pts below state median · ▼ 37 pts below county median

Grade 421%

School 21% · District 33% · ▼ 12 pts below district

▼ 16 pts below state median · ▼ 26 pts below county median

Grade 524%

School 24% · District 36% · ▼ 12 pts below district

▼ 6 pts below state median · ▼ 16 pts below county median

Grade 624%

School 24% · District 27% · ▼ 3 pts below district

▼ 7 pts below state median · ▼ 19 pts below county median

English language arts

Grade 314%

School 14% · District 34% · ▼ 20 pts below district

▼ 27 pts below state median · ▼ 35 pts below county median

Grade 434%

School 34% · District 35% · ▼ 1 pts below district

▼ 8 pts below state median · ▼ 17 pts below county median

Grade 537%

School 37% · District 50% · ▼ 12 pts below district

▼ 8 pts below state median · ▼ 18 pts below county median

Grade 663%

School 63% · District 46% · ▲ 17 pts above district

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

Science

Grade 522%

School 22% · District 38% · ▼ 16 pts below district

▼ 6 pts below state median · ▼ 19 pts below county median

This schoolPaso Robles Joint Unified, 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 5Lower-income33%Higher-income50%17 pp gap

Mathematics

Grade 5Lower-income21%Higher-income33%12 pp gap