Mariposa Elementary, Mariposa CA

Original Research by School Decision on Mariposa Elementary

Mariposa Elementary serves kindergarten through eighth grade in a small foothill town in the foothills east of the Central Valley. The school sits on Jones Street in Mariposa, the county seat, a historic Gold Rush town of roughly three thousand residents that functions as both a local service center and a gateway stop for Yosemite visitors.

The student body is a mix of backgrounds. Just over half the enrollment is white, with a quarter Hispanic, and smaller shares of students from Asian, Black, Native American, and multiracial families. A substantial majority of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, reflecting the area's economic constraints tied to tourism-dependent seasonal work and limited high-wage local employment. The school serves roughly four hundred students across nine grades, making it a medium-sized K-8 in a rural county setting.

Academic performance at Mariposa Elementary is well below proficiency across both tested subjects. In mathematics, results vary by grade but trend upward as students progress. Third graders show the weakest performance, while eighth graders reach roughly four in ten students meeting proficiency standards. English language arts shows a similar climb with grade level, beginning in the low teens for third grade and reaching about half of eighth graders meeting standards. In science, where only grades five and eight are tested, just one in four fifth graders meet standards, though results improve modestly by eighth grade. These patterns suggest that students gain ground as they move through the middle grades, but from a low starting point. A parent may want to look into further with the school what instruction and support strategies are being used in the elementary grades to strengthen foundational skills, and whether this upward trend continues beyond eighth grade.

The school is a regular public school, not a charter or magnet program, and serves all students without special admissions. English learner and special education enrollment counts were not reported in available data, leaving a gap in the profile of how those populations are supported.

Housing in the zip code is significantly less expensive than the state average, roughly half the statewide median for a single-family home. While that affordability is an asset for families on limited incomes, the area faces acute workforce housing shortages. The district partnered with the Mariposa Arts Council and Sierra Foothill Conservancy to launch expanded-learning and child-care programming in spring and summer 2023, a response to a community gap in out-of-school care that has persisted as a real family need in this remote rural setting. The town itself has no traffic lights and no chain stores downtown, with civic anchors including the county library, courthouse, and trail access to Stockton Creek Preserve a short walk away.

Mariposa Elementary is the only K-8 school in the district, and enrollment data for comparison districts was not available, so positioning this school's achievement relative to its county neighbors could not be completed. The school serves a community with real constraints: limited local economic opportunity, significant child-care gaps, and housing scarcity. That context shapes both the student population it enrolls and the support systems families need alongside the school itself.

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Academic performance

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

Math

Grade 319%

School 19% · District 24% · ▼ 5 pts below district

▼ 24 pts below state median

Grade 436%

School 36% · District 22% · ▲ 14 pts above district

▼ 2 pts below state median

Grade 520%

School 20% · District 16% · ▲ 4 pts above district

▼ 10 pts below state median

Grade 633%

School 33% · District 20% · ▲ 12 pts above district

▲ 2 pts above state median

Grade 742%

School 42% · District 42%

▲ 11 pts above state median

Grade 844%

School 44% · District 27% · ▲ 17 pts above district

▲ 16 pts above state median

English language arts

Grade 311%

School 11% · District 17% · ▼ 6 pts below district

▼ 30 pts below state median

Grade 431%

School 31% · District 27% · ▲ 4 pts above district

▼ 11 pts below state median

Grade 531%

School 31% · District 31%

▼ 14 pts below state median

Grade 638%

School 38% · District 27% · ▲ 11 pts above district

▼ 6 pts below state median

Grade 744%

School 44% · District 48% · ▼ 4 pts below district

▼ 2 pts below state median

Grade 854%

School 54% · District 39% · ▲ 15 pts above district

▲ 10 pts above state median

Science

Grade 525%

School 25% · District 28% · ▼ 3 pts below district

▼ 3 pts below state median

Grade 837%

School 37% · District 28% · ▲ 9 pts above district

▲ 11 pts above state median

Social studies

Grade 848%

School 48% · District 46% · ▲ 2 pts above district

▼ 1 pts below state median

This schoolMariposa County 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 8Lower-income46%Higher-income67%21 pp gap

Mathematics

Grade 8Lower-income35%Higher-income60%25 pp gap