The top reported proficiency rate is 24% in English language arts. The lowest is 13% in Science.
Original Research by School Decision on Lincoln Elementary School
Lincoln Elementary School serves kindergarten through fifth grade in DeKalb, a university city anchored by Northern Illinois University with a preserved downtown, active industrial and data-center growth, and a mix of residential neighborhoods. The school sits on DeKalb's east side on Sunset Place, serving an enrollment drawn from across the district's attendance zones.
The school's enrollment is small for its grade band, distributed across six grades with kindergarten as the largest cohort and fifth grade the smallest. The student body is evenly split between Black and white students, with smaller populations of Hispanic, multiracial, and Native American students. Free-or-reduced-price lunch data was not available, so the school's economic composition cannot be assessed from the data at hand.
Academic performance at Lincoln Elementary is substantially below expectations across tested grades. In math, the most recent state assessment results show proficiency rates in the low range across grades three through five, with fifth grade performing lowest. English-language arts results are similarly low across those grades, though fifth-grade ELA proficiency is measurably higher than in math. Science proficiency in fifth grade is also low. These results place the school's overall proficiency index at the bottom quartile when compared to other schools in DeKalb County; parents may want to look into this further with the school directly, including asking about curriculum, intervention programs, teaching stability, and any planned instructional changes.
Data on teacher staffing, attendance, discipline, and chronic absenteeism was not available, so the broader school environment cannot be characterized here. The school's website, if one exists, was not provided.
The district is currently undertaking a structural reorganization called Vision For28, which includes a two-section addition planned for Lincoln Elementary. The district also approved a property-tax levy increase for 2025 that will translate into measurably higher school tax bills for homeowners starting in 2026, driven by health-insurance premium increases and the loss of state transportation reimbursement. A countywide sales-tax referendum backed by the district to ease property-tax burden failed in November 2024 and was not placed back on the April 2025 ballot, meaning the property-tax relief parents had been promised did not materialize.
Housing in the DeKalb area is modestly priced relative to national benchmarks and affordable relative to median household income. Median home value and typical monthly rent are both below state and national averages, and the rent-to-income ratio is manageable. The local economy is anchored by Northern Illinois University employment, healthcare (Northwestern Medicine/KishHealth), and industrial and distribution firms including 3M, Nestlé, and Target; Meta's large data center on the south side is in active expansion. The community offers a public transit system linking to Chicago's Metra, a walkable downtown with cultural anchors including the Egyptian Theatre, and recreational trails and parks.
Lincoln Elementary is a regular public school serving its assigned neighborhood, not a magnet or charter. It belongs to DeKalb CUSD 428 and faces the district's broader fiscal and structural challenges as they unfold.
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