The top reported proficiency rate is 70% in Social studies. The lowest is 34% in Math.
Original Research by School Decision on Kankakee Valley Middle School
Kankakee Valley Middle School serves sixth through eighth grade in the northwestern corner of Jasper County, Indiana, on a campus that sits outside the town proper in Wheatfield Township. The school is part of the Kankakee Valley School Corp and draws from a very small, rural community. Wheatfield itself occupies a tiny fraction of a square mile and has a mix of residential and limited commercial uses, including restaurants, u-pick blueberry farms, and a shrimp farm. Most residents drive to work, and the commute is not short. Civic life centers on the Town Hall and a branch of the Jasper County Public Library, and the annual Sandhill Crane Festival draws visitors each fall. Housing values in the area, based on the latest data, sit below the national benchmark but above the state benchmark, and the local unemployment rate is modest by national standards.
The middle school enrolls a sizable student body for a rural middle school, and its population is overwhelmingly white, with a substantial Hispanic minority. Just under half of the students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, a share that aligns with the economic profile of the area. The school’s grade band means it does not have a graduation rate to report, and data on special education identification and English learner enrollment is missing, so a parent who wants to understand how those populations are served would need to follow up with the school directly.
On state assessments, the school’s results present a mixed picture. In English language arts, about two in five students scored proficient or above, and in math, roughly one in three did. Science results were a little higher, with over two in five students meeting the bar. These figures place the school’s overall proficiency level above the midpoint relative to the two districts in Jasper County. A parent should note that the social studies data is older and from a different state test, so it is not directly comparable to current measures. The participation rate on the state tests was very high, which means the results reflect nearly all enrolled students.
The school operates as a regular public school with no charter or magnet status, and its Title I status is not reported in the available data. No program offerings were available in the records, so it is not possible to describe the breadth of electives, extracurriculars, or specialized pathways a family might find here. The district brief turned up no recent changes in curriculum, facilities, or policy that would alter a family’s decision-making.
For a family considering this area, Kankakee Valley Middle School sits at the center of a quiet, car-dependent rural community where housing is more affordable than the national average and where the school’s academic performance is in the middle of the county range. The town shows slow, steady population growth with little new development. A parent who values a traditional small-town setting with a manageable school size and wants to dig deeper into the school’s special education and English learner services will need to make direct inquiries, since that information is not available in the public data.
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