Piedmont Middle, San Jose CA - Test Scores & Data

Original Research by School Decision on Piedmont Middle

Piedmont Middle is a traditional public middle school serving grades six through eight in the Berryessa Union Elementary district, located in San Jose's southeast residential neighborhoods. The school enrolls a mid-sized student body drawn from a diverse community where roughly half the students are Asian, about a third are Hispanic, and smaller numbers identify as white, multiracial, or other ethnicities. Approximately a third of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch.

On California's state assessments administered in the 2024-25 school year, Piedmont Middle shows a clear strength in English language arts and a softer picture in mathematics and science. In ELA, proficiency across all tested grades averages in the low sixties, with seventh grade performing above that range and sixth and eighth grades at comparable levels just below. In mathematics, proficiency sits in the low forties across the grade band, with seventh grade slightly ahead of the sixth and eighth grades. Science proficiency, measured in eighth grade, falls in the upper thirties. When compared against other school-level testing results across Santa Clara County's districts, Piedmont's overall proficiency index sits below the midpoint of the county's schools. The data spans only a single year, so trajectory cannot be assessed.

The school sits within the Berryessa Union Elementary district, a traditional district-operated system. Parents may want to look into what support is available for mathematics, given the larger proficiency gap in that subject relative to ELA. The school's data sections do not include information on chronic absenteeism, discipline, staffing, or special education and English learner enrollment, so those dimensions are not visible here. No web-derived details on the school's course offerings, athletics, clubs, or recent operational changes were available.

San Jose, where the school is located, is Silicon Valley's largest city and a patchwork of distinct neighborhoods. The southeast area where Piedmont Middle sits is largely single-family residential with a suburban character. Downtown San Jose and its immediate precincts are undergoing sustained urban densification, but that growth is distant from this school. The local housing market in the school's zip code reflects Bay Area costs, with home values well above national medians and rents elevated; the area is not affordable by national standards, though it sits slightly below state median values. Tech employment dominates the regional economy, with Cisco, Google, and Apple among the largest employers in the area.

For a family considering Piedmont Middle, the key takeaway is a school with solid English language arts results but where mathematics proficiency is a soft spot worth discussing directly with the school about available support, intervention, or grouping options.

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Academic performance

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

Math

Grade 640%

School 40% · District 50% · ▼ 10 pts below district

▲ 9 pts above state median · ▼ 6 pts below county median

Grade 745%

School 45% · District 54% · ▼ 9 pts below district

▲ 15 pts above state median · even with county median

Grade 838%

School 38% · District 47% · ▼ 9 pts below district

▲ 10 pts above state median · ▼ 2 pts below county median

English language arts

Grade 662%

School 62% · District 65% · ▼ 3 pts below district

▲ 18 pts above state median · ▲ 4 pts above county median

Grade 765%

School 65% · District 69% · ▼ 3 pts below district

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

Grade 862%

School 62% · District 65% · ▼ 3 pts below district

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

Science

Grade 840%

School 40% · District 46% · ▼ 7 pts below district

▲ 14 pts above state median · ▲ 3 pts above county median

Social studies

Grade 850%

School 50% · District 65% · ▼ 15 pts below district

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

This schoolBerryessa Union Elementary, 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 6Lower-income45%Higher-income71%26 pp gap

Grade 7Lower-income56%Higher-income71%15 pp gap

Grade 8Lower-income52%Higher-income67%16 pp gap

Mathematics

Grade 6Lower-income26%Higher-income47%21 pp gap

Grade 7Lower-income32%Higher-income54%22 pp gap

Grade 8Lower-income27%Higher-income44%17 pp gap