The top reported proficiency rate is 40% in Science. The lowest is 18% in English language arts.
Original Research by School Decision on Inola Es
Inola Elementary is the primary school for students in prekindergarten through fourth grade in the Inola Public Schools district. Serving a small, growing town roughly a half-hour east of Tulsa, the school sits in a community that blends rural residential properties, a downtown business district, and a significant industrial presence anchored by a major tissue paper factory that opened in 2020 and has plans to double its workforce. The town styles itself the "Hay Capital of the World" and holds an annual Hay Days celebration, and a neighboring Amish community sends children to Inola schools.
The student body of just over a half-thousand children is one where white students make up the largest share, followed by a substantial American Indian or Alaska Native population, and a notable share of students identifying with two or more races. Smaller groups of Hispanic and Asian students round out a school that reflects the broader demographics of the area.
State testing results from the most recent school year for third and fourth graders show an academic picture that families will want to examine closely. In third-grade English language arts, just over one in ten students scored proficient or above. Fourth-grade ELA was higher, with roughly one in five students reaching that level. In math, the third-grade proficiency rate was also about one in five, while the fourth-grade math result was suppressed for privacy reasons, so no figure is available there. The only science result comes from a prior year; it showed that two out of five fifth graders scored proficient or above, though the state changed the cut scores for science testing that year, so that figure cannot be directly compared to earlier or later results. The school’s overall proficiency index, which averages performance across tested subjects and grades, places it below the midpoint among districts in Rogers County.
A parent considering Inola Elementary should understand that these results describe where students are performing now, but the school serves only the earliest grades. The typical pattern in schools at this level is that testing begins in third grade, so there is no prior achievement trajectory to examine. The school does not have a graduation rate to report because it does not serve high school grades. No chronic absenteeism data was available, nor were figures on students with disabilities or English learners. A family would want to ask the school directly about supports for students who are behind grade level and about how the school tracks progress from kindergarten through the primary years.
Housing in the area is somewhat more affordable than the national median, and the local unemployment rate has run near the national average. The town proper has seen population growth in recent years, and the ZIP code area that includes the surrounding unincorporated land has also grown substantially. Much of that growth is tied to the industrial development, which has brought new jobs and could continue to draw families.
The district did not show any recent major changes to curriculum, property taxes, or school boundaries in publicly available sources. That stability may appeal to some families, but it also means the district has not signaled a particular reform or strategic initiative in the open record.
Inola Elementary sits in a community that is part bedroom town, part industrial hub, part agricultural center. A family moving here for work at the Sofidel plant or commuting to Tulsa will find a small school where the academic results are below the county average and where the early-grade focus means there is no track record yet for how students perform as they move into middle and high school. For a family that values a rural-adjacent setting with a growing economic base and wants to engage directly with the school on its academic approach, this is a place worth investigating in person.
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