Turkey Hill School, Orange CT - Test Scores & Data

Original Research by School Decision on Turkey Hill School

Turkey Hill School is a public elementary school serving grades one through six in Orange, Connecticut, a residential suburb west of New Haven. The school enrolls a small population of students, with roughly balanced class sizes across the grade span. The student body is predominantly white, with smaller shares of Asian, Hispanic, multiracial, and other students. About one in eight students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch.

On state assessments, Turkey Hill's performance splits by grade level and subject. In math, the school shows solid strength in the lower and upper grades: third graders and sixth graders both reach proficiency at rates well above the school's average across all tested grades. Fourth grade math proficiency is also strong. Fifth grade math, however, falls noticeably lower, suggesting either a cohort effect or a curricular transition point that warrants attention. In English language arts, the pattern is more consistent. Third grade ELA proficiency is below the school's overall ELA average, but grades four, five, and six are all high. Science proficiency, tested only in grade five, is solid. Overall, across all tested subjects and grades combined, Turkey Hill ranks in the top quartile among districts in South Central Connecticut Planning Region, placing it well above the regional median.

As a grades 1-6 school, Turkey Hill feeds students into the regional Amity system: sixth graders advance to Amity Middle School-Orange, located a few miles north. The school sits in Orange's primarily residential landscape, serving families in neighborhoods that cluster around the town's low-density single-family-home character. The town has affluent housing values and rents, with median household income relatively high. Affordable housing in Orange remains very low, though a recent development on Smith Farm Road began adding units in late 2023. Most families rely on cars for transportation, though some use the West Haven or Milford Metro-North stations for commuting.

At the district level, Orange's elementary schools recently moved to a state-mandated, science-of-reading K-3 reading curriculum as part of Connecticut's Right to Read law, with full implementation completing in 2025. This represents a lasting change in how the youngest readers are taught. The district also added a DEI Instructional Coach to support culturally responsive teaching across schools. These shifts reflect an intentional effort to align instruction with modern literacy science and to ensure school climate supports all students' sense of belonging.

Specific data on special education enrollment and English learner counts for Turkey Hill were not available. Trend data showing how the school's proficiency rates have changed year over year was also not provided, so readers cannot see whether recent performance represents improvement, decline, or stability. Parents may want to ask the school directly about support services, special-education identification rates, multilingual learner enrollment, and whether fifth-grade math performance in prior years suggests an ongoing pattern or a single-cohort fluctuation.

See more original research from School Decision →

Academic performance

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

Math

Grade 379%

School 79% · District 70% · ▲ 9 pts above district

▲ 24 pts above state median · ▲ 28 pts above county median

Grade 477%

School 77% · District 72% · ▲ 5 pts above district

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

Grade 561%

School 61% · District 62% · ▼ 1 pts below district

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

Grade 688%

School 88% · District 75% · ▲ 13 pts above district

▲ 49 pts above state median · ▲ 56 pts above county median

English language arts

Grade 374%

School 74% · District 64% · ▲ 10 pts above district

▲ 26 pts above state median · ▲ 28 pts above county median

Grade 477%

School 77% · District 74% · ▲ 3 pts above district

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

Grade 581%

School 81% · District 78% · ▲ 3 pts above district

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

Grade 682%

School 82% · District 77% · ▲ 5 pts above district

▲ 31 pts above state median · ▲ 36 pts above county median

Science

Grade 579%

School 79% · District 74% · ▲ 6 pts above district

▲ 27 pts above state median · ▲ 37 pts above county median

This schoolOrange 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.