The top reported proficiency rate is 40% in English language arts. The lowest is 20% in Science.
Original Research by School Decision on Dupont (pierre S.) Middle School
duPont (Pierre S.) Middle School sits on West 34th Street in Wilmington, serving grades six through eight as part of the Brandywine School District. It is a regular public school, neither a charter nor a magnet, and its enrollment makes it a sizable middle school for its grade band. The student body is majority Black, with white students forming the next largest group, followed by smaller Hispanic and Asian populations and a small multiracial segment. The school does not report free-or-reduced-price lunch counts, special education rates, or English learner figures in the data provided, so the economic profile of the student population is something a parent would need to ask the school about directly.
On state assessments, the most recent results show a school where roughly a third of students reach proficiency in math and just above that in English language arts. Science proficiency is markedly lower, with only about a fifth of tested students meeting the bar. Social studies results, reported separately and from the prior year, show a wide gap between grade levels: sixth-grade proficiency sits near half, while eighth-grade drops to under a third. A parent may want to look into what drives that grade-level difference with the school.
The multi-year trend tells a story worth understanding. ELA proficiency has fallen substantially over the past decade, from a majority of students proficient in the mid-2010s to the current level. The decline was gradual before the pandemic and then steepened, with a notable drop and only modest recovery since. Math followed a similar arc, dipping after the pandemic and edging back up only slightly in the last couple of years. The most recent math and ELA results do show small upticks from the prior year, which could be an early sign of stabilization, but the data does not yet establish a clear rebound trend.
Against its neighbors, the school lands above the midpoint among districts in New Castle County on overall proficiency. That positioning reflects the combined results across tested subjects and grades, and it places duPont in the upper half of the county's district cohort, though well short of the top. This is a school whose academic outcomes are middling-to-decent relative to its county peers but below where they stood several years ago.
The school lists a course catalog among its program offerings, and the data does not detail specific electives, advanced coursework, or extracurriculars. No information was available on discipline, staffing ratios, attendance, chronic absenteeism, or Title I status. Because this is a middle school serving grades six through eight, no graduation rate applies. No comparison data on graduation or chronic absenteeism was available for the school level.
Wilmington is Delaware's largest city and its corporate, financial, and governmental center. The downtown core is compact and grid-patterned, dense with bank towers and office buildings, while surrounding neighborhoods are more residential. The city's economy was historically rooted in chemical manufacturing through DuPont and shifted toward national banking and finance after the Financial Center Development Act drew major institutions to the city. More than half of Fortune 500 companies are incorporated in Delaware, and the city remains a hub for legal and financial services. The Riverfront area, a revitalized former shipyard and industrial zone, has become a newer civic gathering space with restaurants, galleries, and trails. Wilmington Train Station provides direct Amtrak and SEPTA service to Philadelphia, and I-95 bisects the city. Cultural anchors include the Delaware Art Museum, The Grand Opera House, and Nemours Mansion and Gardens.
Housing in the school's zip code is modest relative to state and national benchmarks. Home values sit well below the Delaware state benchmark and below the national figure, and rents are similarly affordable. The price-to-income ratio suggests that buying a home in this area is within reach for many households compared with much of the state, and rents absorb a reasonable share of income. Home values have dipped slightly year over year while rents have risen modestly. For a family considering the area, the housing market here is relatively accessible compared with much of New Castle County and the state at large.
Publicly reported information on the Brandywine School District did not surface specific parent-relevant changes or initiatives from recent years that would meet a lasting-impact threshold. We looked for strategic priorities, facility changes, or program launches and found little, so we left that out rather than guess.
What this school offers is a large, diverse middle school experience in an urban setting with affordable housing and strong transit access, set against a backdrop of academic results that have declined from higher levels and now sit in the upper-middle range for the county. A family weighing duPont would be weighing a school whose proficiency trend has been heading downward but whose most recent results show slight improvement, and whose science results are a clear soft spot. The absence of data on economic disadvantage, special education, and English learner populations means a parent should ask the school directly about those supports before drawing conclusions.
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