The top reported proficiency rate is 35% in Science. The lowest is 29% in Math.
Original Research by School Decision on Wailuku Elementary School
Wailuku Elementary School sits in the heart of Wailuku, the county seat of Maui, a town that grew from a sugar plantation company settlement into a government and commercial hub for central Maui. The school serves pre-kindergarten through fifth grade and is part of the Hawaii Department of Education, the single statewide district that administers all public schools in Hawaii. Its location on South High Street places it directly within Wailuku's walkable downtown grid of wooden storefronts, civic buildings, and older residential streets climbing toward ʻĪao Valley, rather than on a separated suburban campus. For a parent, that means the school is embedded in the daily life of the town, near the library, county buildings, and the small businesses along Market Street.
The student body reflects Wailuku's plantation-era heritage of immigration from across the Pacific and beyond. Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander students make up the largest group, followed by Hispanic students and students of two or more races, with smaller Asian and white populations. A majority of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, which aligns with the economic profile of central Maui's working communities rather than the resort corridors of South and West Maui. The school does not report figures for English learners or special-education enrollment in the data available, so those shares remain unknown here.
On state assessments, Wailuku Elementary's results lean modest. In English language arts, the percentage of students scoring proficient or above sits in the upper twenties to high thirties across third, fourth, and fifth grades, with fifth grade the strongest. Math proficiency runs lower, in the upper twenties for third and fourth grade and dipping further in fifth grade. Science, tested only in fifth grade, lands in the mid-thirties. Participation rates are high across all tested grades, which means the scores reflect nearly the entire student body rather than a self-selected subset. Only one year of data is available, so there is no trend to describe. The school's average scale scores were not reported, and no multi-year comparison is possible. A parent looking at these numbers may want to ask the school how it is supporting math growth in the upper elementary grades and what interventions are in place.
Wailuku itself is a town of modest growth compared to the island's resort areas. The Kehalani development, built on former plantation land in the 1990s, brought newer housing to the southern edge of town, while the historic core retains older plantation-era homes and low-rise commercial buildings. Housing values in the school's zip code are well above the national median and above the Hawaii state benchmark, reflecting the broader island housing shortage. Rents are also high, with a typical renter spending a substantial portion of income on housing. The median home value has eased modestly over the past year, but affordability remains a real constraint for families considering a move into the attendance area. County government and Maui Memorial Medical Center are the dominant employers, giving the town a stable institutional base rather than a tourism-dependent one.
The Hawaii Department of Education, which governs Wailuku Elementary, is a single statewide district, so the school's policies, curriculum standards, and accountability framework flow from Honolulu rather than a local board. The district brief returned no specific recent policy or curriculum changes of note, so there is nothing new to flag on that front.
For a family weighing Wailuku Elementary, the school offers a community-rooted setting in a historic town with deep multicultural roots and a stable civic economy. The academic results are a soft spot, particularly in math, and the data does not yet show whether scores are moving. What the school does provide is a neighborhood campus within walking distance of downtown Wailuku, a peer group that mirrors the town's diverse working-class and middle-class population, and a place in a community where government, healthcare, and small business anchor the local economy rather than hotels and resorts.
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