Robert W. Coleman Elementary, Baltimore MD

Original Research by School Decision on Robert W. Coleman Elementary

Robert W. Coleman Elementary is a regular public school in west Baltimore serving students from pre-kindergarten through fifth grade. It is part of Baltimore City Public Schools, a large urban district. The school sits in the 21216 zip code, an area where the typical home value has notably declined recently compared to the prior year and sits well below the state benchmark. Rents in the area have been rising over the same period. Baltimore itself is a city of historic rowhouse neighborhoods, a major port, and a service economy anchored by Johns Hopkins Hospital and University. The city’s population has seen a slight decline in recent years, and a major infrastructure project to replace the collapsed Francis Scott Key Bridge is underway.

Enrollment at Coleman is modest for its grade band, and the student body is almost entirely Black. A very substantial share of students qualify for free or reduced-price meals, placing the school in a high-poverty context. Data on students with individualized education plans and English learners was not available in the data we examined.

In terms of academic performance, the picture is straightforward. On the Maryland state assessments administered in the 2024-25 school year, proficiency rates in math were low across all tested grades, ranging from a very small share of students meeting the bar in fourth grade to a slightly larger share in third and fifth grades. In English language arts, the results were similarly low, though fourth graders recorded a somewhat higher rate than their peers in the other grades. On the fifth-grade science assessment, the share of students reaching proficiency was very small as well. When compared to other schools within Baltimore City, Coleman’s overall proficiency across tested subjects and grades placed in the bottom quartile of that group. Only a single year of assessment data was available, so there is no trend to compare against.

This is a high-poverty elementary school where state test results show that very few students are meeting grade-level benchmarks in reading, math, or science. A parent considering this school may want to look into this further with the school to understand what supports are in place for students who are behind, and what the school's approach to accelerating academic growth looks like. The district brief we reviewed did not surface any recent changes at the district level of specific, lasting relevance to parents. The school's website and family outreach could provide more detail on before- or after-school programming, tutoring, and family engagement efforts. As a pre-K through fifth grade building, there is naturally no graduation rate to report, nor would one apply.

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Academic performance

How students perform on state tests, by grade, set against the district.

Math

Grade 310%

School 10% · district not reported

▼ 27 pts below state median · ▼ 7 pts below county median

Grade 46%

School 6% · district not reported

▼ 22 pts below state median · ▼ 4 pts below county median

Grade 510%

School 10% · district not reported

▼ 11 pts below state median · ▲ 4 pts above county median

English language arts

Grade 34%

School 4% · district not reported

▼ 43 pts below state median · ▼ 21 pts below county median

Grade 421%

School 21% · district not reported

▼ 24 pts below state median · ▼ 1 pts below county median

Grade 514%

School 14% · district not reported

▼ 26 pts below state median · ▼ 3 pts below county median

Science

Grade 53%

School 3% · district not reported

▼ 16 pts below state median · ▼ 1 pts below county median

This schoolBaltimore City Public Schools, same grade

Graduation rate (ACGR) reflects the federally published Adjusted Cohort Graduation Rate for the most recent year available. We refresh this data annually at the close of each academic year in June. The federal source publishes a banded rate (for example, "90-94%") instead of an exact number for cohorts small enough to risk identifying individual students. The state distribution chart, where shown, plots every school in the state with a published rate or band; schools whose rate is federally suppressed are excluded. Where the federal source publishes a band rather than an exact rate, the school is placed within its band using a stable, ID-derived offset, so its position is consistent across visits.