Juan Pablo Duarte - Jose Julian Marti School No 28, Elizabeth NJ

Original Research by School Decision on Juan Pablo Duarte - Jose Julian Marti School No 28

JuanPablo Duarte - Jose Julian Marti School No 28 sits in Elizabeth, a dense urban city that serves as the Union County seat. The school is a regular public school within Elizabeth Public Schools, serving children from prekindergarten through eighth grade. Elizabeth itself is a highly diverse, growing city with a mix of residential neighborhoods, major retail destinations, and heavy industrial and port infrastructure. The Port Newark-Elizabeth Marine Terminal and Newark Liberty International Airport anchor the local economy, and the city’s population has expanded substantially in recent decades. Two NJ Transit rail stations and extensive bus service connect residents to the region.

The school enrolls a large student body for a PK-8 school. The student population is predominantly Hispanic, with a much smaller share of Black students and a still smaller portion of White students. A very substantial share of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, indicating a high-poverty environment. Data on students with disabilities and English learners was not available in the provided records, so a parent may want to ask the school directly about the supports available for those groups.

State assessment results cover math, English language arts, and science across multiple grades. Proficiency rates in math were low at every tested grade level, with the share of students scoring proficient or above declining from third to seventh grade. In English language arts, proficiency rates were also low in the early grades but improved somewhat by sixth through eighth grades, though they remained below a majority. Science results, available for fifth and eighth grades, were very low. When looking across all tested subjects and grades, the school’s overall proficiency index placed it well below the median among districts in Union County.

Because the school does not serve high school grades, there is no graduation rate to report. The absence of graduation data is simply a function of the grade band.

The housing market in Elizabeth shows home values that sit somewhat above the national benchmark but below the state average for New Jersey. Rents have risen noticeably year over year. The county’s housing market has seen a moderate number of listings and a relatively short median time on market. For a family considering moving to the area, the city offers a range of neighborhoods with distinct characters, and the school is one of many in a large district.

No information was provided about specific programs, after-school offerings, or course access. The district brief turned up no recent parent-relevant changes to report. Similarly, data on discipline, staffing, and attendance were absent from the file, leaving gaps a family would want to fill through direct inquiry.

This school serves a community with high economic need and a richly diverse student body. The test results suggest that the typical student faces considerable academic challenges relative to county peers. A parent evaluating this school should consider what kind of academic support and enrichment the school provides, and how it addresses the needs of a large population of students from low-income backgrounds. The school’s setting in a busy, transit-connected urban center means that families have access to the wider resources of Elizabeth, but the school itself did not show any standout academic metrics in the available data. For those who value a neighborhood school in a dense, diverse city and are prepared to engage actively with the school’s staff around student progress, this could be a fit, but the academic picture is one that warrants a close look.

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Academic performance

How students perform on state tests, by grade, set against the district.

Math

Grade 327%

School 27% · District 37% · ▼ 10 pts below district

▼ 23 pts below state median · ▼ 14 pts below county median

Grade 420%

School 20% · District 32% · ▼ 12 pts below district

▼ 26 pts below state median · ▼ 16 pts below county median

Grade 522%

School 22% · District 33% · ▼ 11 pts below district

▼ 21 pts below state median · ▼ 14 pts below county median

Grade 618%

School 18% · District 26% · ▼ 8 pts below district

▼ 15 pts below state median · ▼ 8 pts below county median

Grade 716%

School 16% · District 21% · ▼ 5 pts below district

▼ 19 pts below state median · ▼ 6 pts below county median

English language arts

Grade 314%

School 14% · District 30% · ▼ 16 pts below district

▼ 32 pts below state median · ▼ 28 pts below county median

Grade 422%

School 22% · District 37% · ▼ 14 pts below district

▼ 33 pts below state median · ▼ 25 pts below county median

Grade 532%

School 32% · District 40% · ▼ 9 pts below district

▼ 22 pts below state median · ▼ 18 pts below county median

Grade 637%

School 37% · District 53% · ▼ 16 pts below district

▼ 17 pts below state median · ▼ 16 pts below county median

Grade 736%

School 36% · District 56% · ▼ 20 pts below district

▼ 21 pts below state median · ▼ 19 pts below county median

Grade 838%

School 38% · District 55% · ▼ 16 pts below district

▼ 20 pts below state median · ▼ 20 pts below county median

Science

Grade 512%

School 12% · District 15% · ▼ 3 pts below district

▼ 16 pts below state median · ▼ 8 pts below county median

Grade 83%

School 3% · District 9% · ▼ 6 pts below district

▼ 10 pts below state median · ▼ 4 pts below county median

This schoolElizabeth Public Schools, same grade

Graduation rate (ACGR) reflects the federally published Adjusted Cohort Graduation Rate for the most recent year available. We refresh this data annually at the close of each academic year in June. The federal source publishes a banded rate (for example, "90-94%") instead of an exact number for cohorts small enough to risk identifying individual students. The state distribution chart, where shown, plots every school in the state with a published rate or band; schools whose rate is federally suppressed are excluded. Where the federal source publishes a band rather than an exact rate, the school is placed within its band using a stable, ID-derived offset, so its position is consistent across visits.

Proficiency by household income

English language arts

Grade 3Lower-income13%Higher-income19%6 pp gap

Grade 4Lower-income26%Higher-income0%26 pp gap

Grade 5Lower-income26%Higher-income62%36 pp gap

Grade 6Lower-income41%Higher-income22%19 pp gap

Grade 7Lower-income37%Higher-income33%3 pp gap

Grade 8Lower-income40%Higher-income33%6 pp gap

Mathematics

Grade 3Lower-income26%Higher-income31%5 pp gap

Grade 4Lower-income22%Higher-income7%15 pp gap

Grade 5Lower-income20%Higher-income33%14 pp gap

Grade 6Lower-income17%Higher-income22%5 pp gap

Grade 7Lower-income17%Higher-income12%5 pp gap