Valley Stream Memorial Junior High School, Valley Stream NY

Original Research by School Decision on Valley Stream Memorial Junior High School

Valley Stream Memorial Junior High School serves grades seven through nine in a mid-sized suburban junior high setting within the Valley Stream Central High School District. The school draws roughly a thousand students, with enrollment distributed fairly evenly across the three grade levels. The student body is diverse in composition: roughly a third identify as Black, just over a third as Hispanic, about a fifth as Asian, and smaller shares of white students and other groups. Roughly forty-five percent of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch.

On recent state testing, the school's performance shows mixed results that a parent should examine closely. In seventh-grade mathematics and English language arts, proficiency rates are in the mid-range, with about sixty percent meeting standards in math and roughly fifty-five percent in ELA. Eighth-grade performance declines noticeably: math proficiency drops to about fifty percent, ELA to roughly fifty-two percent, and science proficiency falls to about forty percent. The school's overall proficiency index places it below the midpoint among the county's Nassau County districts, suggesting academic performance that lags the broader regional picture. Testing participation rates for eighth grade are notably low, at around twenty to forty percent, which makes those grade-level results less representative of the full cohort and is worth exploring with the school directly. A parent may want to look into the reasons for the low participation and what support systems exist for students who are not being assessed or who are not meeting proficiency targets.

The specific academic struggles in eighth-grade science are pronounced enough to merit attention; roughly sixty percent of tested eighth graders did not meet proficiency standards in that subject. State testing data for ninth grade and for social studies at the school are not currently reported, so the full picture of upper-level academic performance is incomplete.

The broader Valley Stream Central High School District has invested substantially in career and technical education pathways, with five two-year CTE programs now operating across the high schools, including medical assisting, nurse assisting, barbering, and a new construction trades program. These programs prepare students for industry credentials and dual-enrollment college opportunities, which shapes the pathway students from this junior high can expect to encounter as they advance. In May 2025, voters approved significant capital investments including property acquisition for future expansion and funds for facility restoration and renovations, signaling the district's commitment to facility improvements and growth.

Valley Stream itself is a mid-sized suburban village on Nassau County's South Shore, roughly twenty miles east of Manhattan, with a residential character anchored by single-family homes alongside commercial corridors and the major regional retail draw of Green Acres Mall. The village center is anchored by a walkable downtown along Rockaway Avenue and a Valley Stream LIRR station, which connects to regional transit. The community includes over a hundred acres of parkland and state-managed parks. Housing values and rents are consistent with Nassau County suburban norms and reflect the broader Long Island market; families should expect above-state-average housing costs reflective of proximity to New York City.

The junior high sits within a district that is actively building out infrastructure and career pathways for its high school students, which shapes the academic ecosystem students will enter after eighth or ninth grade. For a family considering this school, the question is less whether this junior high matches county or state averages (it does not; it sits below the midpoint) and more whether the school's support systems address the eighth-grade performance dips, how the school engages with the district's career-technical offerings to prepare students for high school transitions, and whether the low testing participation reflects broader attendance or engagement concerns worth investigating.

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Academic performance

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

Advanced Placement & IB

1 subject offered · 2023-24

Each card is one AP or IB subject. The headline number is the share of students scoring 3 or higher on the exam — the threshold for college credit at most universities. The bar below each rate shows the underlying distribution across performance levels.

Score:12· no credit345· extremely well qualified

History and Social Sciences

Human Geography

38 tested · Grade 9

50.0%

scored 3 or higher

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	300	70.0%
Math	293	85.0%

Math

Grade 762%

School 62% · District 63% · ▼ 1 pts below district

▲ 9 pts above state median · ▼ 7 pts below county median

Grade 851%

School 51% · District 53% · ▼ 2 pts below district

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

English language arts

Grade 755%

School 55% · District 57% · ▼ 3 pts below district

▲ 8 pts above state median · ▼ 4 pts below county median

Grade 852%

School 52% · District 58% · ▼ 6 pts below district

▲ 4 pts above state median · ▼ 4 pts below county median

Science

Grade 839%

School 39% · District 42% · ▼ 2 pts below district

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

Social studies

Grade 886%

School 86% · district not reported

▲ 7 pts above state median · ▼ 8 pts below county median

This schoolVALLEY STREAM CENTRAL HIGH 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 7Lower-income50%Higher-income61%12 pp gap

Grade 8Lower-income41%Higher-income62%21 pp gap

Mathematics

Grade 7Lower-income51%Higher-income74%23 pp gap

Grade 8Lower-income47%Higher-income54%7 pp gap