The top reported proficiency rate is 32% in English language arts. The lowest is 8% in Math.
Original Research by School Decision on S T E M Academy
S T E M Academy is a middle grades school serving seventh and eighth graders in Calumet City, a south suburban community on the Illinois-Indiana border. The school is part of Dolton School District 149 and sits on Pulaski Road in a neighborhood mix of residential and commercial corridors.
The school's enrollment is small, drawing students almost entirely from the surrounding area. The student body is predominantly Black, with a small number of Hispanic and multiracial students and very few white students. Free-or-reduced-price lunch data and counts of students with individualized education plans and English learners were not available in the district records.
State testing results for math and English language arts are available only for eighth grade in the most recent school year. In eighth-grade math, performance is quite low, with only a small share of students meeting state proficiency standards; a parent may want to look into what support structures are in place for students who are not yet proficient and what the school's plan is to strengthen math outcomes. Eighth-grade English language arts performance is also below state midpoint but notably stronger than math, with roughly one in three students reaching proficiency. Eighth-grade science results show proficiency at approximately one in five students. Math and ELA results for seventh grade, and science results for grades five through seven, were not reported, as the school does not serve those students (it serves grades seven and eight only) or because the state testing data for those grades was not yet available.
Test participation rates were strong, near complete, suggesting the school's assessments have good coverage. The school uses the state's regular assessment program; proficiency standards shifted this year, so trend comparisons with prior years are not yet reliable. Across the three tested subjects and the one grade with complete results, the school's overall proficiency index places it in the bottom quartile relative to districts across Cook County.
Seventh-grade enrollment is somewhat smaller than eighth-grade enrollment, suggesting cohort sizes in the range of low to mid-hundreds. The school does not report graduation rates because it does not serve high school students.
Dolton School District 149 made two notable changes for families in the 2024-2025 school year. It reorganized its middle schools into grade-level centers and moved sixth graders from elementary into the middle schools, shifting the traditional transition point from elementary to middle. Alongside this structural change, the district expanded a Career and Technical Education program that began the prior year. The program now includes cosmetology, barbering, agriculture, performing arts, music production, skilled trades, and culinary arts, and has grown substantially to serve a few hundred students across grades six, seven, and eight. This gives parents at S T E M Academy exposure to vocational and career exploration during the middle grades.
Housing in the Calumet City area is modestly priced relative to the Chicago region and other parts of Illinois, with median home values in the modest range and monthly rents moderate. The local economy centers on retail, health care, transportation and warehousing, and light manufacturing; River Oaks Center, a major regional mall, is among the largest local employers. The city sits along the South Shore Line commuter rail and receives Pace bus service, offering connections to Chicago and northwest Indiana. Growth has been flat to declining in recent years, though the city has announced major redevelopment plans for River Oaks that envision mixed-use housing, retail, and amenities.
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