The top reported proficiency rate is 12% in Science. The lowest is 6% in Math.
Original Research by School Decision on Primitivo Garcia Elementary
Primitivo Garcia Elementary serves students in pre-kindergarten through sixth grade as a regular public school within the Kansas City 33 district, located near downtown Kansas City. It is one of many elementary schools in a large urban district that recently regained full state accreditation after a period of provisional status, a change that signals the district is meeting state standards overall. For families looking at this school, the picture is defined by very high poverty, a racially diverse student body, and academic proficiency rates that are among the lowest in Jackson County.
On state assessments, across tested grades in math, English language arts, and science, the share of students scoring at the proficient level is very low. In third grade math, for example, only a tiny fraction of students meet the standard, and the pattern holds in fourth, sixth, and in English language arts at every tested grade. Science results in fifth grade are similarly low. Compared with other districts in Jackson County, the school’s overall proficiency index sits in the bottom quarter, meaning most other schools in the county see markedly higher performance. A family considering this school will want to ask what academic supports are in place for students who are not yet reaching grade-level benchmarks, and whether intervention programs such as tutoring or targeted instruction are offered.
The school’s enrollment is approximately 425 students, with class sizes that appear moderate for the grade band. The student body is predominantly Black, with a substantial Hispanic population and smaller shares of white, Asian, multiracial, and Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander students. Every student qualifies for free or reduced-price lunch, reflecting the concentrated poverty of the surrounding neighborhood. Data on the share of students with disabilities or those learning English were not available in the materials reviewed, so a parent may want to ask about these populations directly.
The school sits in Kansas City, a sprawling urban center that is largely car-dependent but has walkable pockets downtown and in nearby districts. The civic and cultural core is centered around the River Market, the Plaza, and the Crossroads Arts District, and the city is known for its parks, boulevards, and a developing streetcar line. The school’s location near 17th Street puts it within a mixed-use urban fabric, though specific neighborhood walkability or transit access was not detailed in the data. Housing in the zip code area shows prices near a mid-sized metro average, with rents roughly in line with national norms. Kansas City’s economy is anchored by health systems, logistics, financial services, and government employment, and the city has seen modest population growth and downtown residential development in recent years.
The district brief notes that Kansas City Public Schools received full state accreditation in 2022 after several years of provisional status, and it has maintained accredited standing since then. That is a meaningful shift for families who might have worried about the district’s oversight and long-term stability. But accreditation measures the district as a whole, not individual schools, and at Garcia Elementary the academic results remain a clear concern.
Program offerings, such as art, music, or after-school activities, were not included in the available data. Discipline statistics, chronic absenteeism rates, and staffing ratios also were not provided. For families assessing whether this school fits their child, those are gaps that matter. The foundational reality is a high-poverty school with very low test scores in an urban district that has turned a corner on accreditation but still faces the challenge of raising learning outcomes school by school.
See more original research from School Decision →