The top reported proficiency rate is 41% in Math. The lowest is 33% in English language arts.
Original Research by School Decision on Kate Dowdall Elementary School
Kate Dowdall Elementary School sits on Shilleagh Drive in Flint, Michigan, and operates as a regular public school within the Kearsley Community School District. It is listed as serving kindergarten through fifth grade, though the current enrollment is concentrated heavily in the second and third grades, with only a handful of students in kindergarten and first grade and none in the upper elementary grades. This unusual distribution is worth asking the school about directly, as it may reflect a transitional year, a building reconfiguration, or a district-level enrollment pattern that the available data does not explain.
The school serves a student body where a very large share of children qualify for free or reduced-price meals, reflecting the economic conditions of the surrounding community. The enrollment is predominantly white, with smaller groups of Black, Hispanic, and multiracial students. Information on English learners and students with individualized education programs was not reported in the data we reviewed, so those population figures remain an open question.
On state assessments, Dowdall's third-grade results show a mixed picture. In math, a moderate share of tested students reached proficiency, and in English language arts, a smaller share did. Pulled together, the school's overall proficiency index places it in the top quartile relative to districts across Genesee County, which is a meaningfully strong position given the economic context the school operates within. No multi-year trend data was available, so it is hard to say whether these results represent improvement, stability, or a single-year snapshot. The state did not report participation rates, and chronic absenteeism data was not available for this school.
Flint itself is a mid-sized post-industrial city whose identity was shaped by General Motors manufacturing. The company's workforce reductions over decades drove steep population decline, and the city has spent recent years recovering from the lead water crisis by securing a new water source, replacing lead service lines, and distributing filters. Publicly reported sources describe ongoing revitalization centered on downtown Saginaw Street, where the Capitol Theatre, Sloan Museum, and seasonal festivals like Back to the Bricks bring periodic street life. Outside that core, Flint is largely auto-dependent, with residential neighborhoods spread across a wide area and gaps in the urban fabric from demolition activity. Walkability is limited and uneven.
The housing market around the school reflects this history. Home values in the school's zip code are quite low compared with state and national benchmarks, making ownership relatively accessible on paper. Rents are also modest. County-level listing data shows the Genesee County market with steady inventory and moderate demand, with median listing prices well below the state figure. Homes tend to sell within a reasonable window, and the supply-demand balance appears to favor buyers somewhat. For a family considering the area, housing affordability is one of the more tangible advantages.
At the district level, Kearsley Community School District passed a bond issue in 2022 to improve school facilities, a publicly reported investment that affects both building conditions and local property taxes. Beyond that, the district brief did not surface additional programmatic changes or strategic initiatives, so there is little to report on planned shifts a parent might want to anticipate.
Several data gaps are worth naming. No staffing, discipline, course access, or attendance information was available for the school. No Title I status was reported. Civil rights data was absent. And because Dowdall is an elementary school, there is no graduation rate to assess. These gaps mean the picture here leans heavily on assessment results and demographics. A parent weighing this school would benefit from asking the administration about the unusual grade-level distribution, what support services exist for the high proportion of economically disadvantaged students, and how the district's recent facilities investment is being put to use at this building.
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