The top reported proficiency rate is 74% in Math. The lowest is 52% in Science.
Original Research by School Decision on Hillview School
Hillview School serves kindergarten through fifth grade in Pompton Plains, a primarily residential bedroom community in Morris County. The school is part of the Pequannock Township School District, which also operates a middle school and a high school elsewhere in the township. Pompton Plains is a commuter suburb with a small-town feel, positioned roughly twenty miles from Manhattan. Route 23 runs through the eastern side of the community, and the area offers parks, a golf course, and a converted rail trail for biking and walking. The housing market reflects the desirability of the region, with home values in the area well above national benchmarks.
The student body at Hillview is predominantly white, with a Hispanic population representing most of the remaining share. A very small fraction of students are Asian, and even smaller numbers identify as Black or as two or more races. The share of students who qualify for free or reduced-price lunch is low, a common pattern in a community with the area’s income profile. The school serves roughly three hundred students, which is a typical size for an elementary school serving these grade levels. Because Hillview is an elementary school, it does not report a graduation rate, and state testing data is limited to the grades it serves: third, fourth, and fifth.
On the New Jersey Student Learning Assessments, Hillview’s proficiency rates in math and English language arts are strong across the tested grades. In math, third and fifth graders both posted proficiency rates that are high, while fourth graders scored somewhat lower but still at a level that many families would consider solid. In English language arts, the pattern is consistent, with proficiency increasing from third to fifth grade. Fifth graders also take the state science assessment, and on that measure the proficiency rate was lower than in math or English, a pattern that is not unusual for elementary science scores in New Jersey. A parent with a child who struggles in science may want to look into this further with the school.
When compared with other districts in Morris County using a proficiency index that averages performance across tested subjects and grades, Hillview’s overall academic performance falls in the top quartile among its peers. This is an important point for a family evaluating the school. The district does not appear to have undergone any recent major changes, such as a budget referendum or curriculum overhaul, that would be immediately relevant to a parent. The school is a regular public school serving a neighborhood population, and it does not have magnet or charter status.
For a family considering a move to the area, the town of Pompton Plains offers a suburban setting with limited walkability and a reliance on car travel. The community has a historical center, but schools and civic buildings are distributed across the township rather than concentrated in a single downtown area. The elementary school is part of a district that feeds into a single middle school and high school, so a family moving here can expect their child to move through a predictable progression of school buildings. The housing stock is primarily single-family homes, and the area has seen gradual conversion of agricultural land to residential use over time, though no major new developments were identified in publicly available information.
The school’s low share of students from economically disadvantaged backgrounds and its strong proficiency rates in core subjects create an academic environment that is generally well-regarded. The primary caution for a parent would be the science scores, which are notably lower than the math and English results. Otherwise, the picture that emerges is of a solid, high-performing elementary school in an affluent commuter suburb, serving a largely homogenous student population within a district that has a clear feeder pattern through twelfth grade.
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