The top reported proficiency rate is 57% in Math. The lowest is 50% in English language arts.
Original Research by School Decision on Eastlawn Elementary School
Eastlawn Elementary School sits on Ingalls Avenue in Pascagoula, serving pre-kindergarten through fourth grade as part of the Pascagoula-Gautier School District. It is a neighborhood elementary school in a Gulf Coast city where heavy industry and residential life sit side by side. Pascagoula is dominated by shipbuilding and refining, with Ingalls Shipbuilding and Chevron's refinery as anchor employers, and the city publicly promotes itself as family-friendly. The school sits in a community that has seen its population gently decline since a Cold War-era peak, with post-Hurricane Katrina rebuilding still part of the physical landscape.
The school serves roughly three to four hundred children across its grade levels, with the largest concentrations in third and fourth grade. Every student at Eastlawn qualifies for free or reduced-price lunch, which places the school squarely in a high-poverty context. The student body is racially mixed: white students form the largest single group, followed closely by Black students, with a Hispanic population of meaningful size and a smaller group identifying as two or more races. Data on special education enrollment and English learner counts was not reported, so those proportions remain unknown here.
On Mississippi's MAAP assessment, the most recent results show a mixed academic picture. Third grade math is the strongest result, with a solid majority of tested students scoring proficient or above. That number drops in fourth grade math, where just under half reach proficiency. English language arts follows a similar pattern, with a slight majority of third graders proficient and fewer than half of fourth graders clearing that bar. The third grade results suggest the school is building real competence in early grades, particularly in math. The fourth grade dip, especially in ELA, is something a parent may want to look into further with the school, since the gap between third and fourth grade is consistent across both subjects. No trend data was available to show whether this is a one-year pattern or a recurring one, and participation rates were not reported, so the completeness of these results cannot be independently confirmed.
Pascagoula-Gautier School District is undergoing a structural change that could affect families across the system. Jackson Elementary School, located in Gautier, is scheduled to close after the 2025-26 school year. That closure will redraw attendance zones and shift where Gautier families send their elementary-aged children, a change worth tracking for anyone considering a move into the broader district, even if Eastlawn itself is on the Pascagoula side.
The housing market around Eastlawn is affordable by almost any standard. Typical home values in the school's zip code sit well below the Mississippi state benchmark and far below national figures, making ownership relatively attainable for families with moderate incomes. Estimated monthly mortgage costs run below what many renters pay in higher-cost markets, and the ratio of home price to local income is low. This is a community where housing costs are unlikely to be the barrier to attending the school.
Pascagoula itself is car-dependent, with U.S. Route 90 cutting through the city and connecting it to Biloxi to the west and Grand Bay, Alabama, to the east. The downtown core, once the separate town of Scranton, hosts community events and civic functions. Shepard State Park and the Gulf Islands National Seashore offer outdoor access nearby, and the city has Amtrak service connecting it along the Gulf Coast. The built environment bears the marks of hurricane recovery, including rebuilt homes on pilings and beach protection infrastructure.
Eastlawn fits a family looking for a small, early-grades elementary school in an affordable, working-class Gulf Coast community with a mixed-race student body and full economic need. The early-grade math results are a genuine bright spot. The fourth grade slide in both subjects is the main academic question mark, and the absence of special population and participation data leaves some of the picture incomplete. For a family already rooted in Pascagoula's industrial economy, or one drawn by the low cost of living, this is a school where the early years look productive and where the upper elementary years warrant a closer conversation with school staff.
See more original research from School Decision →