The top reported proficiency rate is 66% in Math. The lowest is 54% in Science.
Original Research by School Decision on West Riverside Elementary School
West Riverside Elementary sits on Herschel Street in Jacksonville's historic Riverside neighborhood, a part of the city publicly reported as walkable by local standards, with preserved early-20th-century homes, locally owned businesses along King Street, and a Saturday arts market a short distance away. For Jacksonville, which is broadly car-dependent and sprawling, Riverside is one of a handful of genuinely walkable pockets, and that character shapes the immediate feel of this school's surroundings.
The school serves children from pre-kindergarten through fifth grade, which means state testing results are only available for third grade and above, and no graduation rate applies here. Florida's FAST assessments in math and ELA, along with the fifth-grade statewide science assessment, provide the academic picture for the most recent school year.
Math results show a spread across grades. Fifth graders performed at a notably strong level, with the large majority reaching proficiency. Third graders came in above the midpoint, and fourth graders fell just below it. That fifth-grade math result stands out as a genuine strength. In ELA, the pattern is more consistent but somewhat softer: all three tested grades came in around or just above the midpoint, with third graders and fifth graders fairly close to each other and fourth graders slightly below. Fifth-grade science scores placed roughly half of students at proficiency. A parent who wants to understand how individual grades are trending over time should ask the school directly, because multi-year trend data was not available in what we reviewed, and it is not possible to say whether these scores reflect improvement, stability, or a dip.
The comparison fact-set for Duval County's districts included only two districts, which made a meaningful proficiency ranking unreliable, so we have not placed this school against county neighbors in that way.
The school is a regular public elementary, not a charter or magnet, and draws from its attendance zone in this part of Jacksonville. Enrollment is on the smaller side for an elementary school serving pre-K through fifth grade, with classroom counts that suggest modest-sized cohorts at each grade level. The student body is racially and ethnically mixed: Hispanic students make up the largest share, followed by white students, then Black students, with smaller numbers of students from other backgrounds. Close to half of enrolled students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, meaning the school serves a genuinely economically diverse population. Data on English learner enrollment and students with IEPs was not reported in what we reviewed, so a family with specific support needs in either category should contact the school to understand what services are available.
On the housing side, the zip code surrounding the school has seen home values decline modestly over the past year, putting it well below the Florida statewide median. Rents have edged up slightly. The overall price-to-income ratio is moderate by national standards, and monthly carrying costs on a purchase sit close to what renting costs, which makes the neighborhood accessible by the standards of the broader Jacksonville market. Jacksonville as a whole has been publicly named as one of the country's housing hot spots for affordability and migration, and the metro is growing at a faster pace than the national average, with downtown in particular seeing active residential development across several large projects.
District-level information for Duval County Public Schools was searched but no lasting recent parent-relevant changes could be confirmed, so we left that out rather than speculate.
For a family living in or considering Riverside, West Riverside Elementary offers neighborhood access to a school with mixed but not weak academic results, a diverse student body, and a setting in one of Jacksonville's more livable urban neighborhoods. The fifth-grade math performance is a clear bright spot. ELA and science results are moderate, and a parent may want to ask the school about how specific grade cohorts are progressing and what intervention or enrichment supports exist, particularly given the gap between fourth-grade ELA scores and the stronger math outcomes at the same grade.
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