The top reported proficiency rate is 38% in Math. The lowest is 28% in English language arts.
Original Research by School Decision on South Elementary School of Communications
South Elementary School of Communications serves students in prekindergarten through grade six and is a regular public school in the Metropolitan School District of Martinsville. The school sits in the small city of Martinsville, the Morgan County seat about a half hour southwest of Indianapolis. The city has a downtown courthouse square with locally owned restaurants and shops, a public library branch, and residential neighborhoods that extend outward from the center. A recent annexation pushed the city boundary to the I-69 corridor, which connects Martinsville to both Indianapolis and Bloomington, and the area is seeing slow but steady residential and commercial growth. With a mostly owner-occupied housing market and commute times that suggest many residents work outside the city, Martinsville functions in large part as a commuter community.
The school has a moderate-sized enrollment for its grade band, and the student body is overwhelmingly white, with a small Hispanic population and a trace of students who identify as two or more races. A substantial share of students qualify for free or reduced-price meals, indicating a significant low-income population. Data on students with disabilities and English learners was not available, and a family seeking information on special education or language support programs would need to ask the school directly. The district has a number of other elementary schools in the area, each with a different program focus, and South Elementary has its own theme of communications.
On the 2024-25 ILEARN state assessments, the school’s proficiency results were mixed, and a parent may want to look into this further with the school. In math, roughly two out of every five students tested scored at the proficient or above level, while in English language arts, fewer than three out of every ten students met that bar. In science, about three out of every ten students scored proficient or above. Social studies results for fifth grade were suppressed due to a very small number of test-takers. Overall proficiency across all subjects and grades tested placed the school below the midpoint among districts in Morgan County when compared by an index that averages the rates.
The school serves only early and intermediate grades, so there is no four-year graduation rate to report for this site. Chronic absenteeism data was also unavailable. No state testing results exist for the prekindergarten grade, which is typical for that level, and grade six had no enrolled students at the time of reporting. Because the school does not serve high school grades, there are no Advanced Placement, dual-credit, or career pathway programs to consider at this site.
The school is not a charter school, and its magnet status was not specified in the available data. The district brief turned up no recent parent-relevant changes such as referenda, bond issues, or curriculum shifts that met a clear, lasting-impact threshold, so a reader should not assume any major district-level disruption is in play.
For a family considering this school, the picture is one of a mid-sized elementary in a growing commuter town with a communications-focused theme. The student body has a high percentage of children from low-income households, and while the school offers the pre-K through grade six sequence in one location, the district’s multiple elementary options each with a distinct specialty means families may have choices to weigh. On the academic side, the proficiency numbers for math and English language arts sit below the state and county midpoint, which bears asking about in more detail. The school’s smaller setting and distinctive program focus may appeal to families who value a themed elementary experience within a district that has several such options.
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