The top reported proficiency rate is 23% in Math. The lowest is 20% in English language arts.
Original Research by School Decision on Maryville Elem School
Maryville Elementary School is a K-2 school in Granite City, a working-class steel town on the Illinois side of the Mississippi River in the St. Louis metro area. The school serves an enrollment that skews toward younger early-primary grades, with a student body that is majority white, with substantial shares of Black and Hispanic students and small populations of students from other racial groups.
The school sits in a district that made a significant structural change for 2025-26. The district redrawn its elementary attendance zones and reorganized its grade configurations so that each student attends a K-6 school and a 7-8 junior high based on home address through the completion of eighth grade. Maryville feeds into Grigsby Intermediate School for grades 3-6, so families choosing this area are opting into a multi-building pathway that runs through middle school.
Academic performance data from the most recent year available (2015-16 PARCC testing) show proficiency rates that are below the midpoint in Madison County. Third-grade math proficiency was modest, and fourth-grade math proficiency was notably low. Fourth-grade English language arts proficiency was also low. Science testing data for fifth grade were not available, so a full picture of performance breadth is incomplete. The school's overall proficiency index places it in the bottom quartile among the county's school districts. A parent may want to look into this further with the school, including what instruction changes have occurred since that testing year and what current performance trends look like.
The school's demographics and location reflect Granite City's character. The city is anchored by U.S. Steel's Granite City Works, which has contracted significantly but recently announced a 2026 restart of a blast furnace expected to bring manufacturing jobs back. The city is pursuing infill and neighborhood revitalization, with a downtown entertainment corridor opening since 2022 and a scattered-site housing program selling lots for new single-family homes in older neighborhoods like Lincoln Place, West Granite, and East Granite. Housing is affordable relative to regional and national benchmarks, with median home prices well below both the Illinois and national averages. Granite City's walkability is minimal, with retail and dining concentrated along Nameoki Road and in a downtown district. Public transit connects to Madison County Transit buses and the St. Louis MetroLink light rail system.
The district itself faced a property-tax question in 2023 when it issued working-cash bonds through Illinois's non-referendum process. The district sold the bonds without raising its stated tax rate, committing publicly to absorbing the debt service within existing revenue. For a buyer evaluating schools and housing, this expansion of long-term district debt without a ballot is worth understanding alongside the district's overall financial trajectory.
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