Highlands Elementary School, Jacksonville FL

Original Research by School Decision on Highlands Elementary School

Highlands Elementary sits on DePaul Drive in the northern reaches of Jacksonville, serving children from pre-kindergarten through fifth grade within Duval County Public Schools. The school is a standard neighborhood public elementary, not a charter or magnet program.

The student body is small relative to many elementary schools in a city Jacksonville's size. A large majority of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, which places this squarely in the category of high-need Title I-type schools by economic profile, though Title I status was not confirmed in the data provided. The racial composition is predominantly Black, with smaller shares of Hispanic, multiracial, and white students. Data on English learners and students with IEPs was not available in the records reviewed.

State assessment results from Florida's FAST and Statewide Science assessments, covering third through fifth grade, show proficiency rates that are below the midpoint for both math and reading across all tested grades. Math proficiency is somewhat stronger than reading, with fourth grade performing best in math among the three tested grades. Reading proficiency sits in a narrow band across all three grades, consistently low. Fifth-grade science proficiency falls in a comparable range to math. These results are worth a candid conversation with the school about what additional academic support looks like day to day, particularly in literacy. Multi-year trend data was not available, so it is not possible to say from this data whether performance is improving, holding steady, or declining.

Because this school serves only through fifth grade, there is no graduation rate and no AP or dual-enrollment pathway to evaluate here; those questions belong to the middle and high schools that follow.

Program details were not included in the data provided, so specifics about enrichment, after-school offerings, intervention programs, or instructional approaches are a gap a parent would want to fill directly with the school.

The surrounding zip code sits in Jacksonville's northside, an area that is more auto-dependent and less connected to the riverfront districts and walkable commercial pockets that define better-known parts of the city. Housing in this zip code runs below both the Florida statewide median and the national median, making it one of the more accessible parts of a city that has already been drawing attention as a relatively affordable market by Sun Belt standards. Home values here have edged down modestly over the past year. Rental costs are also on the lower end, and rent-to-income ratios remain manageable compared to tighter coastal markets.

Jacksonville as a whole is in an active period of growth, with major employers in health care, logistics, the military, and financial services driving the regional economy. The northside, where Highlands Elementary is located, benefits from proximity to distribution infrastructure and the naval air station employment corridor, but the neighborhood itself is removed from the downtown investment activity that has been reshaping the riverfront in recent years.

For a family weighing this school, the academic proficiency picture is a real consideration, and the absence of trend data means there is no way from these figures alone to assess the school's direction. A parent would reasonably want to ask the school directly about its literacy intervention approach, how students who are behind grade level are supported, and what the pathway looks like heading into middle school. The economic accessibility of the surrounding housing market, and the school's location within a large and still-growing city with diverse employment options, are the clearest contextual anchors the data supports.

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Academic performance

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

Math

Grade 344%

School 44% · District 59% · ▼ 15 pts below district

▼ 19 pts below state median · ▼ 13 pts below county median

Grade 454%

School 54% · District 60% · ▼ 6 pts below district

▼ 7 pts below state median · ▼ 2 pts below county median

Grade 551%

School 51% · District 54% · ▼ 3 pts below district

▼ 4 pts below state median · ▲ 1 pts above county median

English language arts

Grade 331%

School 31% · District 51% · ▼ 20 pts below district

▼ 25 pts below state median · ▼ 18 pts below county median

Grade 430%

School 30% · District 50% · ▼ 19 pts below district

▼ 24 pts below state median · ▼ 16 pts below county median

Grade 529%

School 29% · District 50% · ▼ 20 pts below district

▼ 25 pts below state median · ▼ 16 pts below county median

Science

Grade 542%

School 42% · District 52% · ▼ 10 pts below district

▼ 11 pts below state median · ▼ 4 pts below county median

This schoolDUVAL, 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.

Proficiency by household income

English language arts

Grade 3Lower-income29%Higher-income35%6 pp gap

Grade 4Lower-income27%Higher-income34%7 pp gap

Grade 5Lower-income26%Higher-income34%8 pp gap

Mathematics

Grade 3Lower-income44%Higher-income44%0 pp gap

Grade 4Lower-income54%Higher-income53%1 pp gap

Grade 5Lower-income43%Higher-income62%19 pp gap