The top reported proficiency rate is 44% in Science. The lowest is 0% in English language arts.
Original Research by School Decision on West Elementary School
West Elementary School serves students from preschool through sixth grade in Butte, Montana, as part of the Butte Elem district. The school sits in a historic mining city that consolidated with Silver Bow County, blending a working-class industrial heritage with residential neighborhoods and an Uptown Historic District that is one of the largest National Historic Landmark Districts in the country. Montana Technological University adds an academic presence nearby.
The student body is predominantly white, with a smaller share of Hispanic students and a handful of students identifying as American Indian, Black, or two or more races. Every single student at the school qualifies for free or reduced-price meals, a strong signal that the school serves a high-poverty population. This concentration of economic need often brings additional federal support and may shape the academic and social services the school provides, though no specific Title I status or staff-student ratios were reported here.
On state assessments, the picture is incomplete. For math and English language arts, the data shows that no students in tested grades were recorded as taking the Smarter Balanced assessments, yielding a proficiency rate reported at zero. This may reflect a data gap rather than a true zero—perhaps the school did not administer those tests to its upper elementary grades, or reporting conventions limited what was captured. A parent would want to ask the school directly about how its students in grades three through six perform in math and reading. Science assessment results are available and show that a share of students met the state’s proficiency standard on the Montana Science Assessment, though the figure is below what would be considered strong. Compared to other districts in Silver Bow County, West Elementary’s overall proficiency index—an average across the subjects that were tested—lands in the bottom quartile. Only two entities in the county had usable data for that comparison, so the benchmark is a narrow one.
No information was provided about the school’s academic programs, course offerings, or extracurriculars. The civil rights and discipline data fields were also empty, and no staffing or attendance metrics appear. The district brief turned up no recent major changes or initiatives that would affect a parent’s decision.
Butte’s housing market is more affordable than the state and national averages, with home values sitting below Montana’s typical figure and rents below the national benchmark, though rents have been rising in recent years. The city’s economy still has a mining core through Montana Resources, alongside public-sector employment and the university. The Berkeley Pit and the Clark Fork River Superfund site anchor the environmental context, and the Uptown district is a draw for heritage tourism.
For a family considering West Elementary, the bottom line is that this is a school serving many children living in poverty, with academic results that, based on available data, trail most other schools in the county. The lack of math and reading testing information is a significant gap that a parent would want to clarify. The school’s small size by elementary standards and its location in a close-knit, historically rooted community may appeal to some, but the academic soft spots and the high concentration of need are realities worth investigating further with the school itself.
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