Joseph Arthur Middle School, O Fallon IL

Original Research by School Decision on Joseph Arthur Middle School

Joseph Arthur Middle School serves grades five through eight in O'Fallon, a mid-sized suburban city in the Metro East region near Scott Air Force Base. The school is part of Central School District 104, a small two-school district where every middle-school family attends this building, making it the hub of the district's upper grades.

The school recently completed a major renovation and expansion project. New gymnasium space, an enlarged cafeteria, and roughly the added square footage across the campus came online in the current school year. For a district where all middle-grade students flow through one building, these facility upgrades addressed capacity and workflow in ways that shape the day-to-day experience.

On state assessment results, Joseph Arthur's performance shows a clear divide between English language arts and mathematics. In ELA, proficiency rates across fifth through eighth grade cluster in the mid-to-upper range, with fourth grade above that baseline and eighth grade close behind. Performance in mathematics is considerably lower across all grades, with rates consistently in the low-to-mid range. Science proficiency in fifth grade is modest; eighth grade science shows better results. The school's overall proficiency index places it above the midpoint among school districts in St. Clair County. Test participation rates are high across subjects and grades, suggesting reliable engagement with assessment.

The enrollment is small, under a few hundred students, distributed fairly evenly across the four grades. The student body is racially and ethnically diverse, with White and Black students each representing a substantial share, and meaningful representation of Asian, multiracial, and Hispanic students. Free-or-reduced-price lunch eligibility data were not available, and specific counts for students with IEPs or English learners were not reported.

O'Fallon itself is a growing community with a walkable historic downtown anchored by the Vine Street Market and restaurants, though most residential neighborhoods and civic anchors sit on separated suburban campuses. The housing market in the county has seen modest home value appreciation, with rentals rising at a slightly higher pace. The area's economy is anchored by nearby Scott Air Force Base, a regional hospital system, and growing corporate operations, with substantial ongoing residential development shifting toward multifamily housing and townhomes alongside traditional single-family neighborhoods.

The school's website or detailed information on course offerings, honors or AP pathways, extracurricular programming, and staffing were not available in the data reviewed.

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Academic performance

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

Math

Grade 437%

School 37% · District 37%

even with state median · even with county median

Grade 532%

School 32% · District 32%

▲ 2 pts above state median · ▲ 8 pts above county median

Grade 632%

School 32% · District 32%

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

Grade 737%

School 37% · District 37%

▲ 8 pts above state median · ▲ 9 pts above county median

Grade 836%

School 36% · District 36%

▲ 13 pts above state median · ▲ 7 pts above county median

English language arts

Grade 465%

School 65% · District 65%

▲ 17 pts above state median · ▲ 12 pts above county median

Grade 556%

School 56% · District 56%

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

Grade 659%

School 59% · District 59%

▲ 9 pts above state median · ▲ 1 pts above county median

Grade 746%

School 46% · District 46%

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

Grade 859%

School 59% · District 59%

▲ 6 pts above state median · ▼ 3 pts below county median

Science

Grade 543%

School 43% · District 43%

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

Grade 853%

School 53% · District 53%

▲ 14 pts above state median · ▲ 10 pts above county median

This schoolCentral SD 104, 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.