The top reported proficiency rate is 13% in English language arts. The lowest is 12% in Math.
Original Research by School Decision on King Es
King Elementary School sits on 6th Street Southeast in Washington's Ward 8, part of the District of Columbia Public Schools system. It is a regular public school serving pre-kindergarten through fifth grade, with an enrollment that is small for its grade band. The student body is almost entirely Black, with a tiny handful of students identifying as Hispanic or multiracial. Free-or-reduced-price lunch data was not available in the records we reviewed, nor were English-learner or special-education counts, so the economic and special-population picture here is incomplete. A parent wanting that detail would need to ask the school directly.
On state assessments, King's results are low. In the most recent reported year, roughly one in nine students met or exceeded expectations in math, and about one in eight did so in English language arts. Science results from an earlier testing cycle were even lower, with proficiency in a reported range that begins at zero and tops out at a small fraction of the tested group. Participation, by contrast, was strong, with nearly all eligible fifth graders sitting for the science exam. No multi-year trend data was available, so it is not possible from the provided records to say whether these numbers are improving, stable, or declining. The school does not serve high school grades, so there is no graduation rate to report, and the pre-kindergarten and early elementary grades are not assessed by the state, which is standard for that age range.
King's ZIP code sits in a housing market that is notably more affordable than the District of Columbia as a whole. Typical home values in the area are well below the broader D.C. benchmark and also below the national figure, and recent year-over-year movement has been downward. Rents, meanwhile, have been climbing and are modestly above where they stood a year prior. For a family weighing buying versus renting, the estimated monthly mortgage in this area is far higher than typical rent, which may make renting the more accessible path for many households. This is a neighborhood where homeownership costs remain a stretch relative to incomes, even with home values below citywide levels.
The surrounding city needs little introduction. Washington is a federal-government town at its core, with the majority of its workforce tied in some way to government, international institutions, lobbying, associations, or tourism. The L'Enfant Plan's broad diagonal avenues and quadrant system shape the city's fabric, and civic life is distributed across many neighborhoods rather than concentrated in a single downtown. King's location in Ward 8 places it in Southeast Washington, an area that has seen continued investment in school facilities. In early 2026, DCPS opened a new middle school addition at Leckie Education Campus, also in Ward 8, expanding middle-grade capacity in that part of the city. Whether that has a direct feeder-path effect for King families is a question worth raising with the school or district.
At the district level, DCPS is operating under a five-year strategic plan called A Capital Commitment, running through 2028, which focuses on academic success, student connection to school, and preparation for next steps. Beginning in the 2025-26 school year, DCPS also implemented a district-wide cell phone restriction during the school day, tied to the Heads Up Distraction-Free Learning Amendment Act. Families considering King can expect that policy to shape the daily classroom environment.
What the provided data does not include is equally important. There is no information on course offerings, specialized programming, staffing ratios, attendance rates, discipline data, or school-level Title I status. Magnet status was not reported. No neighbor comparison set was available, so King cannot be positioned against nearby schools using the records we reviewed. A parent evaluating this school would want to fill in those gaps through direct conversations with school leadership, particularly around what supports are in place for students working below grade level, given the current proficiency results.
King is a small, community-based elementary school in a part of the city where housing is relatively affordable by D.C. standards, in a district actively investing in Southeast facilities. The academic results as reported are a soft spot, and a parent may want to look into this further with the school to understand what interventions and supports are underway.
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