St. Cloud Elementary School, W Orange NJ

Original Research by School Decision on St. Cloud Elementary School

St. Cloud Elementary School serves kindergarten through fifth grade in West Orange, New Jersey, a suburban township that sits between Newark and Manhattan. The school is one of seven elementary schools in the West Orange Public Schools district, a system that recently reorganized its feeder patterns and moved to a central sixth-grade middle school model, a structural change families moving into the area may want to understand when considering school assignments.

The student body is diverse. White students and Black students each make up about three-tenths of enrollment, Hispanic students roughly a fifth, and Asian students and students of two or more races each account for smaller but noticeable shares. A modest share of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, a figure that is low relative to many districts in the county. This combination of diversity and a relatively low percentage of students from low-income households shapes the peer environment.

Academically, St. Cloud performs well on state assessments. In English language arts, the school produces strong results across all tested grades. Fourth-grade reading proficiency is particularly high, and fifth-grade reading remains solid. Math proficiency is also solidly above the midpoint in every tested grade, with fourth graders again showing the strongest performance. Science proficiency, assessed only in fifth grade, is lower than the school’s math and reading numbers, and a parent may want to ask the school about its approach to elementary science instruction. Overall proficiency across tested subjects and grades places St. Cloud in the top quartile relative to other districts in Essex County, which includes both urban and affluent suburban communities. This is a meaningful strength.

As a kindergarten-through-fifth-grade school, St. Cloud does not have its own graduation rate or secondary-level measures. Students move on to the district’s central sixth-grade middle school and then to West Orange High School. The available data does not include staffing ratios, course access, or chronic absenteeism figures, so a full picture of student support systems and day-to-day school climate is not complete from this information alone. A family interested in the school would benefit from visiting and asking about class sizes, enrichment opportunities, and how the school supports students across different performance levels.

West Orange itself is a largely residential township with civic life anchored along Main Street in the Valley section, where the municipal building, library, and a growing arts district are located. The township is framed by two large county parks, South Mountain Reservation and Eagle Rock Reservation, which provide extensive trail networks and recreational space. Major local employers include healthcare facilities and a large shopping mall. The district expanded its full-day pre-K program substantially in recent years, and the shift to a centralized sixth-grade model is a structural change that families should explore when thinking about the full elementary-to-middle-school pathway.

For a family looking at St. Cloud, the academic picture is one of consistent strength in reading and math across the elementary years, set within a diverse school community in a township that blends suburban residential life with access to both Newark and New York City. The science score is a softer spot worth a conversation with the school. The absence of data on staffing, discipline, and attendance means those dimensions remain unknown from this review, and a parent should seek them out directly.

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Academic performance

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

Math

Grade 366%

School 66% · District 58% · ▲ 8 pts above district

▲ 16 pts above state median · ▲ 27 pts above county median

Grade 473%

School 73% · District 58% · ▲ 15 pts above district

▲ 27 pts above state median · ▲ 34 pts above county median

Grade 562%

School 62% · District 59% · ▲ 2 pts above district

▲ 19 pts above state median · ▲ 30 pts above county median

English language arts

Grade 366%

School 66% · District 58% · ▲ 8 pts above district

▲ 21 pts above state median · ▲ 25 pts above county median

Grade 488%

School 88% · District 69% · ▲ 19 pts above district

▲ 33 pts above state median · ▲ 36 pts above county median

Grade 580%

School 80% · District 70% · ▲ 10 pts above district

▲ 26 pts above state median · ▲ 32 pts above county median

Science

Grade 550%

School 50% · District 46% · ▲ 4 pts above district

▲ 23 pts above state median · ▲ 33 pts above county median

This schoolWest Orange 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 4Lower-income73%Higher-income91%19 pp gap

Grade 5Lower-income70%Higher-income81%11 pp gap

Mathematics

Grade 4Lower-income55%Higher-income76%21 pp gap

Grade 5Lower-income20%Higher-income69%49 pp gap