The top reported proficiency rate is 43% in English language arts. The lowest is 39% in Science.
Original Research by School Decision on Juliette Low Elem School
Juliette Low Elementary is a small K-5 school in Arlington Heights serving about four hundred seventy-five students across six grades in a community with a strong redeveloped downtown and diversified employment base that includes healthcare, corporate offices, and manufacturing. The school sits in Comm Cons SD 59, a district that in recent years has faced significant governance changes. In 2023 the school board rejected a superintendent-led reorganization that would have reconfigured elementary schools into separate grade-level centers, and subsequent board appointments in 2024 solidified a new majority that did not renew the superintendent's contract in 2025. The district is currently in a search for new leadership, signaling a material shift in direction that parents should understand when evaluating schools here.
The student body is diverse. About four in ten students identify as Hispanic, about three in ten as white, and smaller shares as Asian, Black, or multiracial. A modest number of students are American Indian or Alaska Native. Free-or-reduced-price lunch data and English learner enrollment figures are not publicly reported for the school, so a parent evaluating whether this school has the support services their family needs should ask directly.
State assessment data for the most recent school year shows student proficiency below the median for elementary schools in Cook County. In third-grade math, roughly half the tested students met proficiency standards. Fourth-grade math proficiency stood at about one-third, and fifth-grade math at about one-third as well. In English language arts, third graders reached roughly four in ten students proficient; fourth graders about four in ten; and fifth graders about four and a half in ten. Fifth-grade science proficiency was nearly four in ten students. Across all tested grades and subjects, the school's overall proficiency index falls below the county median. A parent may want to look into these results further with the school to understand what curriculum or instructional changes are underway and what support structures exist for students not yet meeting standards.
The housing market in the school's zip code reflects broader Cook County dynamics. Median home values have shown modest growth. Median rental prices have declined slightly in recent months. Days on market and supply metrics suggest a market in moderate balance, neither tight nor deeply oversupplied. The area is affordable relative to national benchmarks, though mortgage and rental costs represent a meaningful share of household income for typical local families.
The locale brief describes Arlington Heights as a mature suburb with a redeveloped downtown core anchored by Metra commuter rail, restaurants, boutique shops, and the Metropolis Performing Arts Centre, alongside a significant corporate and industrial real estate base. The community hosts more than fifty public parks and recreation facilities operated by the Arlington Heights Park District. Two Metra stations provide direct access to Chicago. Growth is active in the downtown corridor with transit-oriented multifamily housing and mixed-use development underway. The proposed Arlington Park redevelopment on the site of the former racetrack, purchased by the Chicago Bears in 2023, remains uncertain in timeline.
Within the district, Juliette Low operates as a traditional neighborhood K-5 school. The district also maintains Ridge Family Center for Learning, a year-round school of choice available to any family within district boundaries by lottery. In 2023, the board chose to preserve both the neighborhood school model and the Ridge program rather than implement the proposed grade-level-center reorganization, a decision that materially affects where families settle and which schools they can access. Beginning in the 2024-25 school year, junior high students district-wide are required to store cellphones in lockers during the school day, a pedagogy change relevant to families with older children.
A parent evaluating Juliette Low should expect to contact the school directly about specific support programs, staffing, and the school's instructional strategy to address the current proficiency gap. The school serves a economically and ethnically diverse student population in a community with reasonable transit access and moderate housing costs, but test results and the recent district governance shifts are clear signals worth exploring in depth before enrolling.
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