Original Research by School Decision on Finley-sharon Elementary School
Finley-Shharon Elementary School sits in Finley, a small community in Steele County, North Dakota. It is a regular public school serving kindergarten through sixth grade, part of the Finley-Sharon 19 district. The school is very small by any standard, with just a handful of students per grade level. This is the kind of setting where teachers know every child by name and across multiple years, and where a single classroom may carry a wide range of ages and abilities together.
The student body is predominantly white, with a small number of students from other racial or ethnic backgrounds. About half of the students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, which points to a meaningful level of economic need within the community. Data on students with individualized education programs and English learners was not reported, so those populations cannot be characterized here.
On the most recent state assessments, covering the most recent school year, the school's results present a mixed picture. Mathematics stands out as a relative strength, with a solid share of students reaching proficiency. Science results also came in at a respectable level. English language arts was more moderate, with roughly half of students meeting the proficiency benchmark. A parent looking at these results might feel encouraged by the math and science performance while wanting to ask the school how it supports reading and writing growth, especially in the early grades. Only one year of assessment data was available, so there is no trend to observe; the results represent a single snapshot rather than an established pattern.
Several pieces of context a parent might want were not available. No community or economic data was provided for Finley, so the local employment picture, housing market, and broader economic conditions cannot be described here. No information was available on staffing ratios, teacher qualifications, course offerings, discipline practices, attendance patterns, or school climate. Civil-rights data was also absent. Families considering this school should reach out directly for those details.
At the district level, a publicly reported change may matter to families with young children. The Finley-Sharon 19 district expanded its grade span to include pre-kindergarten, moving from a kindergarten-through-twelfth configuration to pre-kindergarten-through-twelfth. This means the district now offers early childhood education within its own system rather than leaving families to find those services elsewhere. For a household with a preschool-aged child, that is a concrete addition worth asking about.
What the picture does convey is a very small, rural elementary school where community proximity and individual attention are likely defining features. The academic results are uneven across subjects but show real strength in math. The missing context on staffing, programs, discipline, and the surrounding community limits how fully this school can be assessed from the available data alone, and a family would benefit from contacting the school directly to fill in those gaps.
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