Southdown School, Huntington NY - Test Scores & Data

Original Research by School Decision on Southdown School

Southdown School serves kindergarten through third grade in the Huntington Union Free School District and sits in the Huntington area of Suffolk County. The school has about that size in enrollment, drawn from a diverse community: roughly a majority of students identify as Hispanic, with substantial shares of white students and smaller numbers of Asian and Black students. About a half of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, a proxy for economic need that tracks with broader housing affordability: homes in the area rent for roughly mid-range money and sell at prices above state median but well above national benchmarks, and rent-to-income ratios hover near half of household income.

In the most recent state testing data available, third graders at Southdown showed proficiency rates near seven in ten in both English language arts and math. That positions the school in the top quartile relative to other districts in Suffolk County on overall proficiency across tested subjects and grades. A science result from several years prior showed stronger performance at that grade level, though state science testing is not conducted annually in the grades Southdown serves, so a current science picture was not available.

The school feeds into a district that has undergone real change. The Huntington UFSD board approved a major reorganization of its intermediate schools, effective for the 2026-27 school year. Southdown students will attend Woodhull Intermediate School beginning with fourth grade (the earliest cohort enters in 2026), alongside students from Jefferson Primary School. This reshuffling of feeder patterns is a concrete shift families with younger children at Southdown would plan around. The district has also implemented state-mandated cell phone restrictions during the school day and made changes to high school math sequences and dual-credit partnerships, neither of which directly affect primary grades but signal active curriculum work at the district level.

The broader Huntington context is mixed-income and mixed-use, with the walkable village commercial core near Main Street and New York Avenue coexisting alongside subdivisions and the office-park corridor in Melville. Huntington Station, the area nearest to many schools, is in the middle of a state-funded revitalization initiative bringing new mixed-use housing and transit improvements. For families considering Southdown, it is a primary school in a district serving young learners in a moderate-density, diverse community with strong state assessment results at this grade level and active district-level programming changes underway.

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Academic performance

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

Math

Grade 369%

School 69% · District 62% · ▲ 6 pts above district

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

English language arts

Grade 371%

School 71% · District 62% · ▲ 10 pts above district

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

Science

Grade 488%

School 88% · district not reported

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

This schoolHUNTINGTON 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.

Proficiency by household income

English language arts

Grade 3Lower-income43%Higher-income93%49 pp gap

Grade 4Lower-income31%Higher-income73%42 pp gap

Mathematics

Grade 3Lower-income43%Higher-income88%44 pp gap

Grade 4Lower-income25%Higher-income73%48 pp gap