The top reported proficiency rate is 38% in English language arts. The lowest is 31% in Math.
Original Research by School Decision on Villa Bella Expeditionary School
Villa Bella Expeditionary School is a charter elementary school in Pueblo, serving kindergarten through fifth grade as part of Pueblo County School District 70. It is a regular public school operating under a charter, which means it has its own educational approach while remaining within the district framework.
The school draws its students from a small slice of the city. Pueblo itself is a mid-sized city with an industrial past as a steel center, now more diversified into healthcare, education, and government. The city has a historic downtown with a riverwalk, hosts the Colorado State Fair, and its economy is anchored by major employers like a large medical center, the state mental health hospital, and the public school districts. The school sits in a residential area, and families navigating the area will encounter a city that is largely auto-oriented beyond its walkable downtown core.
One immediate thing families should know is that the entire district, including Villa Bella, operates on a four-day school week, a schedule change that has been in place for some time. This is a structural condition that reshapes weekly routines, childcare arrangements, and the pace of instruction for every family in the district. It is not something a family can opt out of.
The student body of roughly 300 children is split nearly evenly between students who identify as white and those who identify as Hispanic, together making up the vast majority of the school, with smaller shares of students identifying as two or more races, Asian, Black, and American Indian or Alaska Native. Slightly more than a third of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, a share that is moderate for a public elementary school in the region. Data on the number of students with disabilities or English learners was not available in the records reviewed.
Academically, the school's performance on the Colorado Measures of Academic Success is a mixed picture with a notable strength. In English language arts, the share of students scoring proficient or above is higher than the typical school in Pueblo County, placing Villa Bella in the top quartile of elementary schools in the county for overall tested proficiency across subjects. In math, the share of students at that level is lower, and a similar pattern holds in science, where just over a quarter of fifth graders scored at a level considered proficient or above. The school's overall proficiency index, which averages across tested subjects and grades, lands in the top quartile among county elementary schools that have such results. That relative strength in English language arts is the academic anchor of the school profile, while the math and science results suggest areas where a parent may want to look into this further with the school.
The school did not have a calculated graduation rate, which is expected since it only serves elementary grades. There was no data available on chronic absenteeism, course access, staffing ratios, or discipline rates, so a parent interested in those dimensions would need to ask the school directly.
Because this is a small charter elementary, the academic picture is shaped entirely by the state tests given in third through fifth grades. For a family considering this school, the key takeaway is a school that shows relative strength in reading and language arts compared to peers in the county, but with more modest results in math and science, all within the context of a district that has adopted a four-day week. The student body is fairly diverse in terms of race and ethnicity, with a moderate share of students from lower-income households.
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