Emerson Middle School, Union City NJ

Original Research by School Decision on Emerson Middle School

Emerson Middle School is a regular public school serving grades six through eight in Union City, a densely packed urban municipality in Hudson County, New Jersey. It sits within the Union City School District and operates on a traditional academic calendar. The school draws its students from the surrounding neighborhood, a place where multi-family buildings and ground-floor retail line a numbered street grid and where the city’s extremely high population density means there is no suburban campus feel, only schools embedded in the urban fabric.

Academically, the middle school shows a split picture across subjects. In English language arts, students consistently score well above half proficient on the New Jersey Student Learning Assessment in every grade tested. Sixth and eighth graders achieve at a strong level, and seventh graders also clear the halfway mark comfortably. Math results are markedly lower, with a pattern of declining proficiency as students move up. Sixth graders reach a rate that is moderate, but by seventh and eighth grade the share meeting the state’s proficiency bar drops noticeably. The area that gives the most pause is eighth-grade science, where only a small proportion of students reach the state’s proficiency threshold. A parent reviewing these results would want to look into how the school supports students in math and science, particularly given the gap between ELA and those subjects. The overall proficiency index, which averages results across tested subjects and grades, places the school above the midpoint when compared to other districts in Hudson County.

The student body is predominantly Hispanic, making up the vast majority of enrollment. A substantial share of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, reflecting the economic context of the community. The school does not publicly report figures for special education or English learner populations in the available data, so a family seeking specific information on those supports would need to contact the school directly. The enrollment is large for a single middle school, with the largest grade being seventh, followed closely by eighth.

Union City itself is one of the most densely populated places in the United States, a landlocked municipality of less than a square mile that was formed from the merger of two former towns. It has a strong Cuban-American cultural influence and was historically known as the embroidery capital of the country. The city is entirely surrounded by other Hudson County municipalities and shares a border with Jersey City to the south. There is no traditional downtown; civic buildings and schools are woven into the street grid. Given this density and the lack of vacant land, growth is limited to redevelopment of existing parcels. Housing values in the area are high compared to national averages, and renting is common.

The Union City School District is in the midst of a significant capital project. A new building, the Esther Salas Academy, is under construction and expected to open for the coming school year. It will serve grades seven through nine and is designed to ease overcrowding across the district’s middle grades. Families should also note that the district operates a STEM magnet school, José Martí STEM Academy, which earned National Blue Ribbon recognition in 2022. That school offers a specialized option for families who want a focused academic pathway, though it is separate from Emerson Middle School.

For a family considering Emerson Middle School, the core picture is a large urban middle school where students perform well in reading and writing but struggle more in math and especially science. The school sits in a very dense, walkable city with a vibrant street life and deep cultural roots. The district is actively expanding its middle-grade capacity, which may affect attendance boundaries or program offerings in the years ahead.

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Academic performance

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

Math

Grade 642%

School 42% · District 40% · ▲ 2 pts above district

▲ 8 pts above state median · ▲ 15 pts above county median

Grade 728%

School 28% · District 35% · ▼ 7 pts below district

▼ 7 pts below state median · even with county median

Grade 827%

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

▲ 10 pts above state median · ▲ 12 pts above county median

English language arts

Grade 667%

School 67% · District 64% · ▲ 3 pts above district

▲ 13 pts above state median · ▲ 16 pts above county median

Grade 760%

School 60% · District 66% · ▼ 6 pts below district

▲ 3 pts above state median · ▲ 5 pts above county median

Grade 867%

School 67% · District 70% · ▼ 3 pts below district

▲ 9 pts above state median · ▲ 12 pts above county median

Science

Grade 85%

School 5% · District 8% · ▼ 2 pts below district

▼ 8 pts below state median · ▼ 5 pts below county median

This schoolUnion City School District, 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 6Lower-income67%Higher-income74%7 pp gap

Grade 7Lower-income59%Higher-income64%5 pp gap

Grade 8Lower-income65%Higher-income84%19 pp gap

Mathematics

Grade 6Lower-income42%Higher-income47%6 pp gap

Grade 7Lower-income27%Higher-income39%12 pp gap

Grade 8Lower-income25%Higher-income37%11 pp gap