The top reported proficiency rate is 22% in English language arts. The lowest is 7% in Science.
Original Research by School Decision on Forest Heights Elementary
Forest Heights Elementary serves students from prekindergarten through fifth grade as a regular public school within Prince George's County Public Schools. The school is located in Oxon Hill, a suburban, car-dependent unincorporated area in Prince George’s County, Maryland, bisected by the Capital Beltway. The community is a mix of garden apartments, townhouses, and single-family homes built mostly between the 1940s and early 1990s, alongside the large National Harbor mixed-use development on the Potomac River. Major local employers include the MGM National Harbor resort and casino, the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center, and the school district itself. The area has seen significant growth driven by National Harbor, a new high school facility, and ongoing development.
Enrollment at Forest Heights Elementary is moderate for an elementary school serving grades PK through 5. A substantial share of the student body qualifies for free or reduced-price meals. The student population is predominantly Hispanic and Black, with small numbers of White, Asian, and multiracial students. The school is not a charter school, and its magnet status was not reported, nor was its Title I status available in the data provided.
Regarding academic performance, state assessment results from the Maryland Comprehensive Assessment Program and the Maryland Integrated Science Assessment are available for the most recent school year. In English language arts, the share of students scoring proficient or above varied across the tested grades, with third grade showing a higher rate than both fourth and fifth grades. In mathematics, proficiency rates were lower across all three tested grades, with fourth and fifth grades showing a single-digit proportion of students meeting the standard. In science, tested in fifth grade only, the proportion of students scoring proficient or above was low. The district has implemented a district-wide literacy initiative aligned with the science of reading, which would affect how students at Forest Heights are taught to read. Given the school serves only elementary grades, there is no graduation rate to report. Chronic absenteeism data and staffing information were not available in the data reviewed, so a parent may want to look into these areas further with the school.
The data provided for the comparison of this school’s performance relative to districts in Prince George’s County was insufficient to generate a meaningful comparison because the cohort of districts was too small to place the school’s proficiency index. No data was available for graduation or attendance comparisons.
The school’s environment and access characteristics were largely unreported in the data. Locale information, discipline data, course access details, and staffing ratios were not available. The governance type is a regular public school without charter status.
Forest Heights Elementary sits within the Oxon Hill CDP, which has no traditional downtown. Schools are distributed across the area, and elementary schools serving sections of the CDP include several others alongside Forest Heights. The closest thing to a civic or commercial focal point is the Eastover Shopping Center at the D.C. line and the National Harbor waterfront. The housing market in the zip code area shows home values near the national benchmark and rents slightly below it, reflecting the area's relative affordability compared to the broader Washington region. The district approved a budget increase and conducted a boundary review in 2024 that proposed changes for the following school year, which could affect attendance zones.
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