The top reported proficiency rate is 25% in Social studies. The lowest is 13% in Science.
Original Research by School Decision on Daly School
Daly School sits on Michigan Avenue in Inkster, a small Wayne County city about a short drive southwest of downtown Detroit. It is a regular public school serving pre-kindergarten through sixth grade, part of the Westwood Community School District. The school draws from a community with deep historical roots. African American workers at Henry Ford's Dearborn factories settled here in the 1920s and 1930s because they were barred from living in Dearborn itself, and that legacy shaped Inkster's identity as a predominantly Black bedroom community. The city has no traditional downtown; civic and commercial life runs along the Michigan Avenue corridor, with low-density residential streets branching off it. The built environment is car-oriented, with nearby interstate access and limited walkability typical of metro Detroit suburbs.
Inkster's educational landscape is unusual. The Inkster Public Schools district was dissolved entirely, and its students were redistributed among four surrounding districts based on geographic quadrants. Daly School now operates under Westwood Community School District, which serves students from Inkster and nearby areas. Voters in the district approved a bond issue in 2023 to improve school facilities, an investment that will shape infrastructure in the coming years and is reflected in property tax obligations for residents.
The school itself is small for its grade band, with enrollment spread fairly evenly across kindergarten through sixth grade. Nearly every student qualifies for free or reduced-price lunch, and the student body is predominantly Black, with small numbers of Hispanic, white, and multiracial students. Data on special education enrollment and English learner status was not reported, so those figures are not available here.
On state testing through Michigan's M-STEP, Daly School's results are low across every grade and subject that was reported. In math, third and fourth grade proficiency fell into the lowest reporting band, with no students reaching proficient levels in either grade. Fifth grade math showed a modest share of students reaching proficiency, and sixth grade returned to the lowest band. English language arts followed a similar pattern, with small shares of students proficient in fourth, fifth, and sixth grades, and third grade in the lowest band. Fifth grade science and social studies results were also low, though social studies showed the highest proficiency rate among all tested areas at the school.
Measured against districts in Wayne County, Daly School's overall proficiency sits in the bottom quartile. The county's proficiency midpoint is meaningfully higher, and the gap is wide. These results come from small tested groups at each grade level, which means a few students moving in or out of proficiency can shift the picture noticeably from year to year. Still, the pattern across grades and subjects is consistent. A parent considering this school may want to look into what academic support interventions are in place and how the district is targeting these outcomes.
The housing market around Daly School is among the more affordable in the region. Home values in the school's zip code are well below the state and national benchmarks, and rents are modest relative to broader Wayne County. The area has seen some new residential construction and strip mall development along Michigan Avenue, and the city recorded the highest increase in assessed values in Wayne County in a recent year, though the broader population has been declining over recent decades. Listings in the county move at a moderate pace, and affordability metrics suggest that owning in this area costs less than renting when comparing estimated mortgage payments to rents.
What the data does not cover is worth naming. No graduation rate applies here because Daly School does not serve high school grades. Chronic absenteeism data was not available. Information on course offerings, extracurricular programs, staffing ratios, discipline, and school climate was not provided. Program-specific details for this school were not included in the available data, so a family would need to contact the school directly for a fuller picture of what the daily academic and social experience looks like for students.
For a family weighing this school, the core facts are straightforward. It is a small, community-rooted elementary school in an affordable, historically Black suburb, serving a student population that faces substantial economic need. Academic outcomes as measured by state tests are currently low across the board. The district has recently invested in facilities. Whether the school is the right fit depends heavily on what supports are available in the building and how those align with what a child needs, and that is a conversation the data here can start but not finish.
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