Garrison School, Garrison NY - Test Scores & Data

Original Research by School Decision on Garrison School

Garrison School is a small K-8 public school in a rural, low-density hamlet on the Hudson River's east shore, part of the Garrison Union Free School District. The school sits in a deliberately underdeveloped place: Garrison is a bedroom community for New York City, built around scattered single-family homes, winding roads, and cultural institutions rather than commercial strips. Families here value river access, trail networks, and proximity to the Garrison Art Center and Philipstown Depot Theatre over urban amenities. This is not a commuter suburb with sidewalks and chain stores; it is a conservation-minded hamlet where growth is regulated to preserve open space and rural character.

The school's enrollment is small for its grade span. PreK through 8th grade together serve under a few hundred students, with individual grade cohorts ranging from just slightly above a dozen to around thirty. This means your child will likely know most of their classmates by name and grade level changes will be visible in tone and class size. The community itself is predominantly white and affluent, with a small share of Hispanic and multiracial students; specific free-or-reduced-lunch data was not available, so a parent may want to look into this further with the school.

In math, Garrison students show mixed results by grade level. Younger elementary grades (3 and 4) achieve solid proficiency, and grade 5 performs notably well. Grade 6 dips noticeably lower, and grade 7 and 8 sit in the low-to-moderate range. In English language arts, the pattern is more favorable: grades 3 through 7 cluster in the mid-to-high range, and grade 8 achieves universal proficiency on the test. Science was assessed only in grade 5, where students performed well. Social studies data comes from an older assessment and is not current. The school does not report chronic absenteeism or four-year graduation rates, which is expected because the school serves only grades through 8 and has no high school.

When compared to other districts in Putnam County, Garrison's overall proficiency index across tested subjects and grades places it in the top quartile locally, above the county median. This is genuine strength and positions the school favorably among its regional peers.

The school sits within a district that has experienced financial strain. In 2022 Garrison became the first local district to attempt a state tax-cap override after budgets repeatedly exceeded the state allowable limit. A key driver is high school tuition: because the K-8 district has no grades 9-12, it must pay tuition to send graduates to outside high schools (typically Haldane in Cold Spring or O'Neill in Highland Falls). As those tuition costs have grown substantially, they have pushed district budgets above the tax cap, creating pressure on household property taxes. Recent budgets have stabilized through multi-year contracts with receiving high schools, which now extend through 2029, and spending has grown modestly while staying within or at the cap in recent years. Families considering a move should understand that property tax pressure remains a structural feature of this district.

On the positive side, the district has launched a free Universal Pre-Kindergarten program funded by New York State for four-year-olds, which is a new benefit for families with young children and is capped at about eighteen students with a certified teacher and aide.

The surrounding community is picturesque and car-dependent. Garrison's only walkable civic center is Garrison's Landing, a small riverside plaza by the Metro-North station with shops, galleries, a bookshop, and the art center. Everything else is spread across quiet, often unpaved roads through forests and fields. The landing also connects to hiking trails. Commuting to the city takes roughly an hour by train. Housing values are high, reflecting the area's appeal to affluent commuters and second-home buyers; affordability relative to income is strained. Employment is mostly in nonprofits, cultural institutions, and the school itself, so this is not a job center. Families move here for the river, the quiet, the arts, and access to the city, not for local jobs or walkability.

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Academic performance

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

New York Regents Exams

2 courses reported · 2024-25

End-of-course exams required for a New York Regents diploma. Each row shows the cohort size and the share of students scoring at the proficient level or higher.

Course	Students tested	% proficient
Science	25	92.0%
Math	16	94.0%

Math

Grade 377%

School 77% · District 77%

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

Grade 475%

School 75% · District 75%

▲ 17 pts above state median · ▲ 11 pts above county median

Grade 593%

School 93% · District 93%

▲ 42 pts above state median · ▲ 49 pts above county median

Grade 658%

School 58% · District 58%

▲ 13 pts above state median

Grade 771%

School 71% · District 71%

▲ 19 pts above state median

Grade 860%

School 60% · District 60%

▲ 23 pts above state median

English language arts

Grade 377%

School 77% · District 77%

▲ 25 pts above state median · ▲ 20 pts above county median

Grade 465%

School 65% · District 65%

▲ 12 pts above state median · ▲ 1 pts above county median

Grade 579%

School 79% · District 79%

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

Grade 679%

School 79% · District 79%

▲ 33 pts above state median

Grade 771%

School 71% · District 71%

▲ 23 pts above state median

Grade 8100%

School 100% · District 100%

▲ 52 pts above state median

Science

Grade 581%

School 81% · District 81%

▲ 40 pts above state median · ▲ 40 pts above county median

Grade 80%

School 0% · District 0%

▼ 33 pts below state median

Social studies

Grade 5100%

School 100% · District 97% · ▲ 3 pts above district

▲ 8 pts above state median

Grade 897%

School 97% · District 97%

▲ 18 pts above state median

This schoolGARRISON UNION FREE 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.