Swint Elementary School, Jonesboro GA

Original Research by School Decision on Swint Elementary School

Swint Elementary School serves prekindergarten through fifth grade in Jonesboro, Georgia, as a regular public school within Clayton County. The school enrolls a small student body with substantial economic hardship: all students enrolled qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, and the student body is predominantly Black with meaningful Hispanic representation and smaller numbers of Asian, White, and multiracial students.

The school's testing results show low proficiency in core academic subjects. In English language arts across grades three through five, proficiency rates range from the low twenties. Mathematics proficiency is similarly low, with third grade at roughly one-quarter proficient, fourth grade around one-quarter, and fifth grade dropping to around one-sixth proficient. Science proficiency in fifth grade sits in the low twenties. These results fall well below proficiency benchmarks and represent substantial academic need. The most recent data available is from spring 2025; earlier state-assessment data from the 2013-14 school year showed higher proficiency in social studies, though that comparison is limited in usefulness given the time span and changes in assessment design.

Jonesboro itself is a small county seat about eighteen miles south of downtown Atlanta, blending a quaint historic downtown with courthouse, galleries, and indie restaurants along Main Street and Broad Street against a broader suburban landscape of chain retail, big-box stores, and residential streets. The town has been undergoing downtown revitalization with new restaurants, residential projects, and civic investments including Lee Street Park. A major development approval in 2024 for a townhome project on Fayetteville Road signals residential growth focused near the downtown core. Housing in the area is comparatively affordable relative to the Atlanta region.

Clayton County Public Schools, the district serving Swint and Jonesboro, is undertaking significant systemic changes. Voters approved a substantial education bond in 2023 to renovate or replace 36 aging school buildings across the district; this multi-year capital program will reshape school facilities families attend. The district has also adopted Science-of-Reading literacy instruction districtwide, deploying a universal reading screening tool across all K-5 classrooms and launching the "CCPS…Where Literacy Lives" initiative in alignment with Georgia's Early Literacy Act. A new convocation center and college and career academy, scheduled to open in 2025 in nearby Morrow, will expand career-pathway access for high schoolers. These are lasting instructional and infrastructure shifts that affect how reading is taught and what educational pathways are available.

When compared against the five other districts in Clayton County, Swint's overall proficiency index places it in the top quartile, reflecting higher performance than the median district on balance across tested subjects and grades. However, absolute proficiency levels remain low in real terms: fewer than one in four students are proficient across the subjects tested. A parent considering this school may want to look into further detail with the school and district regarding literacy intervention capacity, how the Science-of-Reading shift is being implemented in early grades, and what targeted support exists for students who are not yet proficient.

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Academic performance

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

Math

Grade 328%

School 28% · District 23% · ▲ 5 pts above district

▼ 12 pts below state median · ▲ 6 pts above county median

Grade 425%

School 25% · District 29% · ▼ 4 pts below district

▼ 20 pts below state median · ▼ 1 pts below county median

Grade 516%

School 16% · District 21% · ▼ 5 pts below district

▼ 22 pts below state median · ▼ 5 pts below county median

English language arts

Grade 322%

School 22% · District 17% · ▲ 5 pts above district

▼ 8 pts below state median · ▲ 6 pts above county median

Grade 425%

School 25% · District 23% · ▲ 2 pts above district

▼ 9 pts below state median · ▲ 2 pts above county median

Grade 524%

School 24% · District 25% · ▼ 1 pts below district

▼ 14 pts below state median · even with county median

Science

Grade 523%

School 23% · District 23%

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

Social studies

Grades 3-867%

School 67% · district not reported

▼ 17 pts below state median · ▼ 8 pts below county median

This schoolClayton County, 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.