Cics - Bond Campus, Chicago IL - Test Scores & Data

Original Research by School Decision on Cics - Bond Campus

CICS - Bond Campus is a charter school serving kindergarten through sixth grade on the South Side of Chicago. The school is part of Chicago's diverse K-12 landscape, which includes district-managed schools, other charters, and selective or magnet options. Bond Campus itself operates under the charter framework within Chicago Public Schools District 299.

The enrollment is small for its grade band, with roughly a quarter of the students at each grade level, distributed fairly evenly across kindergarten through sixth grade. Nearly all students are Black, with a small number of Latino and multiracial students; white and Asian enrollment is absent. Data on free-or-reduced-price lunch eligibility, special education, and English learner status were not available.

State testing data from the most recent year show proficiency results in English language arts and math across third through sixth grades. In third grade, proficiency in both subjects sits at roughly the same level. Performance declines in fourth grade, particularly in math where proficiency drops sharply. Fifth grade shows a modest uptick in language arts but remains very low in math. Sixth grade language arts stays at similar levels; math proficiency is minimal. In science, tested only at fifth grade, proficiency is also quite low. These results place the school in the bottom quartile for overall proficiency when compared against other schools in Cook County.

A parent may want to look into these numbers directly with the school to understand what academic supports or instructional strategies are in place and whether the school has plans to address them. State testing was revised in the most recent year, so trend data comparing to prior years is not yet available to show growth over time. Science testing applies only to grades five and eight under state policy, which explains why science results appear only for fifth grade.

The school sits in a Chicago South Side neighborhood where housing values are modest and rent is moderate relative to wider Cook County. The surrounding area has a substantial population that is predominantly Black, consistent with the school's enrollment composition. Chicago itself remains a highly walkable, densely developed city with strong civic anchors in parks and public transit, though neighborhood character and economic conditions vary widely. The city has resumed population growth after a decade of decline, and housing activity, including approvals for new units, has risen in recent years, concentrated downtown and along the lakefront.

Chicago Public Schools is undergoing structural change. The district is transitioning from a fully mayor-appointed board to a fully elected one, with the first elected members seated in 2025 and full elections in 2026. This gives families a direct vote on district governance. The district has also adopted a strategic plan emphasizing neighborhood schools and moved away from its former school-choice emphasis, and it recently replaced numeric school ratings with holistic accountability dashboards launched in late 2024. The district has rolled out Skyline, a unified K-12 curriculum across English language arts, math, science, social science, world languages, and arts, available at no cost to all district schools.

This is a small neighborhood charter serving a concentrated population in a low-income South Side area. Academic proficiency is low across the tested grades and subjects, which is a significant factor parents weighing this school should examine in detail with the school itself. The school's environment, pedagogical approach, and any targeted intervention programs are not available in the data and would be important to understand directly.

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Academic performance

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

Math

Grade 321%

School 21% · District 38% · ▼ 17 pts below district

▼ 25 pts below state median · ▼ 19 pts below county median

Grade 45%

School 5% · District 29% · ▼ 24 pts below district

▼ 32 pts below state median · ▼ 24 pts below county median

Grade 518%

School 18% · District 24% · ▼ 5 pts below district

▼ 11 pts below state median · ▼ 3 pts below county median

Grade 64%

School 4% · District 23% · ▼ 19 pts below district

▼ 20 pts below state median · ▼ 14 pts below county median

English language arts

Grade 321%

School 21% · District 36% · ▼ 15 pts below district

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

Grade 417%

School 17% · District 39% · ▼ 21 pts below district

▼ 31 pts below state median · ▼ 23 pts below county median

Grade 524%

School 24% · District 43% · ▼ 19 pts below district

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

Grade 618%

School 18% · District 45% · ▼ 27 pts below district

▼ 32 pts below state median · ▼ 25 pts below county median

Science

Grade 511%

School 11% · District 29% · ▼ 18 pts below district

▼ 26 pts below state median · ▼ 16 pts below 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.