The top reported proficiency rate is 42% in Science. The lowest is 22% in Math.
Original Research by School Decision on Monticello Elementary School
Monticello Elementary School sits in the county seat of Lawrence County, a small town on the Pearl River where the economy runs on agriculture and pine timber. The community has a historic downtown district along Broad Street, anchored by the Lawrence County Civic Center and Museum, with Cooper's Ferry Park and its scenic river boardwalk just behind it. Publicly reported sources describe a car-dependent town with no public transit, where the passenger train depot closed decades ago and intercity bus service has never existed. The town's population has been declining modestly since the last census, and no major housing developments or commercial projects surfaced in available sources. Recreation centers on Atwood Water Park, with its paved walking trail and campground east of the river, and Lake Mary Crawford, a fishing lake just north of town. The Atwood Music Festival, held over Memorial Day Weekend, is billed as the longest-running festival of its kind in Mississippi.
The school serves kindergarten through fifth grade and is part of the Lawrence County School District. Its enrollment is moderate for an elementary school in this grade band. The student body is almost evenly split between Black and White students, with a small share of Hispanic students and a handful classified as two or more races. The vast majority of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, which reflects the broader economic profile of the area. Housing here is quite affordable by state and national standards, with typical home values well below the Mississippi benchmark and far below the national one. The price-to-income ratio sits below the national average, meaning that for local wage earners, ownership is relatively attainable compared with much of the country.
State assessment results from the most recent year tell a mixed and concerning story. On the Mississippi Academic Assessment Program, English language arts proficiency holds fairly steady across the tested grades, with fifth grade showing the strongest performance. A solid share of fifth graders reached proficiency in ELA. Science results for fifth grade were the school's brightest spot, with a higher portion of students clearing the proficiency bar than in either math or ELA at any tested grade.
Mathematics is where the school struggles most. Third grade math proficiency starts at a modest level and then drops sharply as students move into fourth and fifth grade. By fifth grade, only a small fraction of tested students demonstrated proficiency. This downward slide from third to fifth grade is the clearest pattern in the data, and a parent may want to look into this further with the school to understand what is happening in the upper elementary math pipeline.
Several categories of information were not available. No multi-year trend data was provided, so it is unclear whether these results represent a recent change or a longer-standing pattern. Participation rates were missing across all tested grades and subjects, though the tested counts themselves were reported. Data on individualized education programs and English learners was not provided. No discipline, course access, staffing, or attendance information was supplied. Title I status and school type were not specified in the available data. No program offerings were listed, so whether the school has art, music, physical education, counseling, or enrichment programming could not be confirmed from this material. Civil rights data and neighbor comparisons were absent as well.
We searched for recent parent-relevant changes in the Lawrence County School District but found nothing that could be confirmed as a specific, lasting shift from recent years. The district profile and board information turned up in search results, but no concrete changes surfaced.
For a family considering this area, the housing market is genuinely accessible, and the town offers a quiet, historically rooted small-town setting with civic anchors and outdoor recreation nearby. The school's reading and science results show it is capable of moving a meaningful share of students to proficiency. The math trajectory across the upper grades, though, is the area that warrants the closest attention and the most direct conversation with school staff before enrolling a child in those grades.
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