The top reported proficiency rate is 60% in English language arts. The lowest is 48% in Math.
Original Research by School Decision on Cottondale Elementary School
Cottondale Elementary sits on Levy Street along U.S. Route 90, adjacent to the middle/high school campus on the highway corridor at the western edge of the Florida Panhandle. It serves children from pre-kindergarten through fifth grade, the only tested grades here being third through fifth. The school draws from a small, low-density rural community that, publicly reported sources note, carries a higher-than-average poverty rate and has been working through recovery from Hurricane Michael.
The student body is majority white, with Black students making up a meaningful share and smaller numbers of Hispanic and multiracial students. A substantial portion of the enrollment qualifies for free or reduced-price meals, which places the school in familiar company with many rural Panhandle communities. Data on English learner rates and special-education identification were not available in what we reviewed.
Florida's FAST assessments in 2024-25 give the clearest window into academic performance. In reading and language arts, third graders performed at a level that sits around the middle of Florida's statewide scale, and fifth graders performed above that same middle point, a genuinely encouraging result for the oldest tested cohort. Fourth-grade ELA landed in a similar range to third grade. Math tells a different story: third-grade performance is around that midpoint, but it declines through fourth grade and more noticeably into fifth. By fifth grade, fewer than half of students reached proficiency in math, a gap families will want to ask the school about directly. Fifth-grade science results, from the Florida Statewide Science Assessment, came in closer to the stronger end of the ELA pattern. Multi-year trend data was not available, so it is not possible to say from this data alone whether these results are improving, declining, or holding steady.
Because Cottondale Elementary is the only district in its county comparison set, no peer-group positioning is possible. Graduation rate and chronic absenteeism data either do not apply to an elementary school or were not available for comparison purposes.
On programs, no specific program offerings data was provided. The Jackson County district, which runs this school, publicly reported a voter-approved renewal of its half-cent capital surtax in late 2024, which funds school facilities, maintenance, and the district's one-to-one student device program. That funding continuation is relevant for any family thinking about technology access and building conditions across the district. The district-level changes receiving the most public attention involve schools in the Grand Ridge, Sneads, and Marianna areas; nothing in the available data points to structural changes at Cottondale Elementary itself.
The housing market around the school is quite accessible by statewide standards. Home values here sit well below the Florida median and well below the national median, and the estimated monthly mortgage cost is modest relative to what buyers face almost anywhere else in the state. The area is car-dependent with no public transit; the school and the rest of the community are oriented around highway access rather than a walkable core. The town itself is small, with a flat-to-slightly-growing population, and most development activity is grant-funded infrastructure recovery rather than new residential construction.
For a family rooted in or relocating to Cottondale, the elementary school is the community's only PreK-5 option within the town, with the secondary campus immediately next door. The ELA trajectory through fifth grade shows real strength. The math results, particularly as students move through the upper elementary grades, are the area where a parent would benefit most from a direct conversation with the school about supports and instructional approach.
See more original research from School Decision →