Pine Bend Elementary, Inver Grove Heights MN

Original Research by School Decision on Pine Bend Elementary

Pine Bend Elementary is a regular public school serving prekindergarten through fifth grade in Inver Grove Heights, a suburban city southeast of Saint Paul in Dakota County. The school is part of Inver Grove Heights Schools, a district with five schools distributed across a car-oriented city that blends residential neighborhoods with commercial and industrial employers, including the CHS agricultural cooperative headquarters and the Pine Bend Refinery. The city’s population has been stable in recent years, and its housing market reflects a typical suburban pattern, with home values and rents in a middle range relative to the broader Twin Cities area.

Pine Bend is a modestly sized elementary school. Its student body is diverse: about half of students are white, nearly three in ten are Hispanic, and smaller shares are Black, multiracial, or Asian. Roughly half of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, a rate that places the school near the middle among its peers in the surrounding area. Data on students with disabilities and English learners was not available in the provided information, so a parent may want to ask the school directly about those supports.

State assessment results from the most recent school year offer a mixed picture. In math, proficiency rates start relatively strong in third grade, drop moderately in fourth, and then fall sharply in fifth grade. Reading scores also vary: third and fifth grades show higher proficiency than fourth, which is notably lower. Science results, tested only in fifth grade, are low. Across all tested subjects and grades combined, the school’s overall proficiency index sits just above the midpoint among districts in Dakota County, meaning it performs roughly in line with the middle of the pack in this well-resourced suburban county. Because this is the only year of testing data available, there is no basis to assess trends over time.

Several areas of information are absent from the data provided. No information on chronic absenteeism, discipline rates, staffing ratios, or course access was available. As an elementary school, there is no graduation rate to report. The school’s Title I status is not listed, and there are no details about special programs such as gifted education, music, or after-school offerings. A parent seeking a fuller picture would need to visit the school’s website or contact the school directly to learn about enrichment opportunities, class sizes, and student support services.

The district itself has no publicly reported recent changes in curriculum, referendums, or property tax shifts that would directly affect families, based on the information found. That stability may appeal to parents looking for a straightforward, neighborhood-school experience in a community where most civic and educational institutions sit on separated campuses rather than in a walkable downtown.

Pine Bend Elementary serves a diverse, middle-income suburban population. Its academic results show a school that meets the county average on balance, but with notable variation between grade levels and subjects, particularly a steep decline in fifth-grade math and low science proficiency. Families considering this school may want to explore how the school addresses those gaps and what supports are in place for the transition to middle school.

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Academic performance

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

Math

Grade 357%

School 57% · District 49% · ▲ 8 pts above district

▲ 2 pts above state median · ▲ 3 pts above county median

Grade 448%

School 48% · District 45% · ▲ 3 pts above district

▼ 3 pts below state median · ▼ 6 pts below county median

Grade 517%

School 17% · District 28% · ▼ 11 pts below district

▼ 18 pts below state median · ▼ 25 pts below county median

English language arts

Grade 338%

School 38% · District 37% · ▲ 1 pts above district

▼ 4 pts below state median · ▼ 6 pts below county median

Grade 429%

School 29% · District 35% · ▼ 6 pts below district

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

Grade 545%

School 45% · District 46%

▼ 9 pts below state median · ▼ 12 pts below county median

Science

Grade 511%

School 11% · District 14% · ▼ 3 pts below district

▼ 13 pts below state median · ▼ 19 pts below county median

This schoolINVER GROVE HEIGHTS 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.

Proficiency by household income

English language arts

Grade 3Lower-income17%Higher-income63%46 pp gap

Grade 4Lower-income18%Higher-income43%25 pp gap

Grade 5Lower-income25%Higher-income64%39 pp gap

Mathematics

Grade 3Lower-income37%Higher-income79%43 pp gap

Grade 4Lower-income33%Higher-income66%33 pp gap

Grade 5Lower-income10%Higher-income24%14 pp gap