The top reported proficiency rate is 69% in English language arts. The lowest is 52% in Science.
Original Research by School Decision on Dawes Elementary School
Dawes Elementary is a small neighborhood school serving kindergarten through fifth grade in Evanston's downtown near the lakefront. With enrollment evenly distributed across its grade bands, the school draws from a racially and socioeconomically diverse catchment. Just over a quarter of students are Black, roughly a third are Hispanic, and another third are white, with smaller shares of Asian and multiracial students. The school sits within Evanston CCSD 65, a district currently navigating major structural changes including school closures, boundary shifts, and a new literacy curriculum district-wide.
On state testing, Dawes shows moderate proficiency. In the most recent year, third and fourth graders scored in the low to mid-sixties on the Illinois Assessment of Readiness in math. Fifth-grade math performance dipped to the mid-fifties. English language arts results were more promising: fourth and fifth graders both scored in the high sixties to low seventies, while third grade came in at mid-sixties. Fifth-grade science proficiency was just above the halfway mark. Across the school's tested grades and subjects, proficiency sits in the top quartile among Cook County elementary schools, a meaningful distinction. However, the range between Dawes's strongest and weakest areas is noticeable; reading outpaces math, and performance tends to decline as students progress from third to fifth grade. A parent may want to look into what the school is doing to support math growth in the upper elementary years and what trajectory students follow into middle school.
The school carries characteristics of urban Evanston itself. The housing market in the area is appreciating modestly; median home values have moved upward, and rental costs have inched up as the city pursues new housing development. The neighborhood is walkable and well-served by transit, with CTA and Metra access. Civic anchors include parks, beaches on Lake Michigan a short distance away, and library branches. Evanston is anchored by Northwestern University and anchored professionally by education, health care, and research institutions, which shapes the economic context families encounter.
District 65 is in transition. The closure of Bessie Rhodes, the district's fully bilingual school, takes effect at the end of this school year, and Kingsley Elementary will close alongside it. A new Foster Elementary is opening in 2026-27 to serve the Fifth Ward, absorbing many displaced families and hosting a relocated Two-Way Immersion program. These changes will shift attendance boundaries and school assignments across the district over the coming two years. The district has also replaced its reading curriculum, moving away from Lucy Calkins toward a new K-5 literacy program, and has restructured middle school math to put all students on an advanced track without separate acceleration pathways. At the same time, the district faces structural budget pressure and is considering a new operating tax referendum, potentially on the March 2026 ballot, after a prior building referendum has not closed the deficit gap. Property tax levies have risen by the maximum allowable amount in recent years.
For families considering Dawes, the immediate landscape includes solid English language arts performance in the upper elementary, moderate math proficiency with some softening in fifth grade, and a diverse peer group. The broader district context involves significant operational change, including boundary reassignments that may or may not affect Dawes families directly, a new reading approach already in place, and ongoing budget and tax questions that will shape program stability. Families should confirm current and projected attendance boundaries with the district as closures take effect and ask the school directly about math support strategies and how students transition into District 65's redesigned middle school curriculum.
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