The top reported proficiency rate is 18% in English language arts. The lowest is 9% in Math.
Original Research by School Decision on Wilson Elementary School
Wilson Elementary School serves pre-kindergarten through second grade in Calumet City, a residential-industrial suburb on the Illinois-Indiana border south of Chicago. The school has a student body of roughly 350 students, with each grade from pre-K to second containing between 60 and 110 students. The enrollment is predominantly Black and Hispanic, with smaller numbers of students from other racial and ethnic groups.
The school's test results come from 2016-17, when third graders took the PARCC assessment. At that time, fewer than one in ten students in the tested group met proficiency in math, and fewer than one in five met proficiency in English language arts. Participation in the assessment was low. These numbers place the school well below the midpoint among Cook County school districts in overall proficiency across tested subjects and grades. It is worth noting that this is the only state assessment data available; the school itself serves only grades pre-K through 2, which are not state-tested, so current performance in those grades remains unmeasured by available public data.
Calumet City itself is a working-class, diverse community with a flat or declining population. The city's economy centers on retail (notably the River Oaks shopping center, which is undergoing a large-scale redevelopment plan), health care, transportation and warehousing, and light manufacturing. Walkability varies; the Sibley Boulevard commercial corridor is reasonably walkable, but most residents depend on cars for daily errands. The city has public library and park district amenities and is served by Pace bus routes and the South Shore Line commuter rail, which connects to Chicago and northwest Indiana.
The housing market in the 60409 zip code where the school is located shows modest home values and rental rates that sit below the state benchmark. The market has moderate supply and relatively softer demand as of recent months. Rents have ticked upward slightly while home values have declined modestly year over year.
Calumet City School District 155, the district that operates Wilson Elementary, updated its K-8 social science curriculum in recent years. This is a district-wide instructional choice that affects what students learn across elementary grades.
The school's early grades focus and small enrollment make it a neighborhood anchor for families with very young children. Parents considering Wilson should view the low third-grade test results as a signal to discuss the school's approach to reading and math instruction directly with staff, and to ask about what support is in place for students who fall behind in early literacy and numeracy. The absence of recent performance data from the school's own tested grades (pre-K through 2) means the school's current trajectory remains unclear from public measures alone.
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