Budlong Elem School, Chicago IL - Test Scores & Data

Original Research by School Decision on Budlong Elem School

Budlong Elementary is a neighborhood public school serving prekindergarten through eighth grade in the Foster Avenue corridor on Chicago's North Side. The school enrolls a mid-sized population with a diverse student body: roughly two-fifths Hispanic, a third white, and a smaller share Asian, reflecting the broader neighborhood composition.

The academic profile shows a school where proficiency is mixed by subject and grade level, a pattern worth understanding before enrollment. In English language arts, grades 3 and 4 show proficiency in the mid-to-upper range, grade 6 sits solidly above the midpoint, and grade 8 reaches the strongest results. Grades 5 and 7 fall closer to the lower-middle range. Math tells a more challenging story: grades 3 and 4 hover near the midpoint, but proficiency drops sharply in grades 5 and 6, recovering somewhat by grades 7 and 8. In the sciences tested (grade 5 and grade 8), results land in the lower-to-middle band. Participation in testing is consistently strong across grades and subjects, above 95 percent in nearly all cases.

When measured against other districts in Cook County, Budlong's overall proficiency index sits above the median, a useful anchor point. This positioning reflects the school's stronger showing in reading and some grades in math, even though some grade-to-grade transitions show notable dips.

The school sits within Chicago Public Schools District 299, a district in active transition. The school board shifted from mayoral appointment to elected governance in 2024, with full elections coming in November 2026. More substantive for instructional practice, CPS adopted a five-year strategic plan focused on strengthening neighborhood schools, has rolled out Skyline, its first comprehensive PreK-12 curriculum available to all schools, and replaced numeric school ratings with new dashboard-based accountability in late 2024. These shifts reflect a district moving away from school-choice competition toward investment in neighborhood-based capacity. Parents should be aware that school evaluation frameworks have changed, making historical comparisons complicated.

Staffing and enrollment trend data are not available in the public record, so a parent may want to ask the school directly about class sizes, teacher retention, and whether enrollment is growing, stable, or contracting. Information on special education or English learner enrollment percentages is similarly unavailable here.

Housing in the school's attendance area (the 60625 zip code) sits in an actively appreciating market. Home values have risen modestly year-over-year, and monthly rents have climbed noticeably. The neighborhood remains more affordable than the national housing benchmark, though less so than the Illinois state average, and rent-to-income burden sits in the moderate range for median-income households. The real estate market shows solid supply and cooling demand, suggesting a balanced buyer and renter environment rather than high-pressure conditions.

Chicago itself is in its third consecutive year of population growth after nearly a decade of decline, with new housing approvals rising substantially in early 2026. The city is highly walkable, served by 24/7 transit on the CTA 'L' rail network, and anchored by dense commercial corridors, a 26-mile lakefront, and the Chicago Park District system. Budlong's location on Foster Avenue places it within a connected neighborhood setting, not on an isolated campus.

Budlong is not magnet or selective enrollment, and it serves the full grade range from early childhood through middle school. A parent should expect a traditional public school pathway: students move through the school's grades and transition to a high school placement (possibly selective or school-choice dependent, or to a neighborhood assignment) as eighth grade ends. The school's proficiency pattern, especially the grade-5-through-6 dip in math, is the most direct academic signal available; a parent may want to ask the school what specific interventions or pacing adjustments are in place for students in those grade levels and which students show those gaps most sharply.

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Academic performance

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

Math

Grade 356%

School 56% · District 38% · ▲ 18 pts above district

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

Grade 451%

School 51% · District 29% · ▲ 22 pts above district

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

Grade 529%

School 29% · District 24% · ▲ 6 pts above district

even with state median · ▲ 8 pts above county median

Grade 622%

School 22% · District 23% · ▼ 1 pts below district

▼ 2 pts below state median · ▲ 5 pts above county median

Grade 738%

School 38% · District 27% · ▲ 11 pts above district

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

Grade 838%

School 38% · District 23% · ▲ 15 pts above district

▲ 15 pts above state median · ▲ 21 pts above county median

English language arts

Grade 357%

School 57% · District 36% · ▲ 21 pts above district

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

Grade 462%

School 62% · District 39% · ▲ 23 pts above district

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

Grade 556%

School 56% · District 43% · ▲ 13 pts above district

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

Grade 661%

School 61% · District 45% · ▲ 17 pts above district

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

Grade 747%

School 47% · District 46% · ▲ 1 pts above district

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

Grade 869%

School 69% · District 48% · ▲ 21 pts above district

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

Science

Grade 548%

School 48% · District 29% · ▲ 19 pts above district

▲ 11 pts above state median · ▲ 21 pts above county median

Grade 858%

School 58% · District 31% · ▲ 26 pts above district

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

This schoolChicago Public Schools Dist 299, 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.