Lily Lake Grade School, Maple Park IL

Original Research by School Decision on Lily Lake Grade School

Lily Lake Grade School serves kindergarten through fifth grade in Maple Park, a small farming community on the Kane and DeKalb county line, roughly fifty miles west of Chicago. The school sits within Central CUSD 301, a district that has faced two failed high school referendums in 2024 and now operates several schools with mobile classroom units to manage ongoing enrollment growth.

The school enrolls a small cohort of students, concentrated in the early elementary and upper elementary grades, with a particularly strong cohort in grade four. The student body is predominantly white, with a meaningful Hispanic enrollment and a small multiracial population. Free-or-reduced-price lunch data was not available, and special education and English learner enrollment counts were not reported.

On the most recent state testing in 2024-25, Lily Lake showed mixed but generally solid results. In grade five, which tested across all three subjects, English language arts proficiency was notably strong; mathematics and science proficiency were moderate. Across third and fourth grades, where both English and math were tested, the school showed proficiency rates in the low-to-mid range in math and upper-mid range in English. The school achieved full or near-full participation in administered assessments. Test data for grades six through eight was not available, reflecting the school's K-5 configuration; those grades are served elsewhere in the district.

When measured against the other districts in Kane County, Lily Lake's overall proficiency index places it in the top quartile, a strength that reflects solid fundamentals across its tested grades and subjects.

The community surrounding Lily Lake is rural and small-town in character. Maple Park itself is growing modestly, with new single-family home development underway north of Route 38. The village center remains compact, anchored by the Maple Park Civic Center and public library on Willow Street, while the school sits within the Kaneland campus complex on Keslinger Road, outside the village core. The housing market in the area is moderately valued compared to the state and national benchmarks. Agriculture remains visible in the local economy, alongside small retail and service establishments.

At the district level, parents should be aware that two voter referendums for a new high school failed in 2024, leaving capacity constraints unresolved. The district has signaled that if future funding cannot be secured, it may shift instruction in music, art, and health to cart-based or alternate-location teaching, and may limit expansion of vocational programs. These constraints may not directly affect Lily Lake students now, but they signal the operational pressures facing the broader district as enrollment continues to grow.

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Academic performance

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

Math

Grade 365%

School 65% · District 69% · ▼ 4 pts below district

▲ 19 pts above state median · ▲ 13 pts above county median

Grade 462%

School 62% · District 58% · ▲ 4 pts above district

▲ 25 pts above state median · ▲ 16 pts above county median

Grade 566%

School 66% · District 55% · ▲ 11 pts above district

▲ 36 pts above state median · ▲ 33 pts above county median

English language arts

Grade 364%

School 64% · District 66% · ▼ 2 pts below district

▲ 20 pts above state median · ▲ 19 pts above county median

Grade 470%

School 70% · District 73% · ▼ 3 pts below district

▲ 22 pts above state median · ▲ 23 pts above county median

Grade 590%

School 90% · District 83% · ▲ 8 pts above district

▲ 38 pts above state median · ▲ 35 pts above county median

Science

Grade 568%

School 68% · District 60% · ▲ 8 pts above district

▲ 31 pts above state median · ▲ 28 pts above county median

This schoolCentral CUSD 301, 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.