The reported proficiency rate for English language arts is 17%.
Original Research by School Decision on Stidham Public School
Stidham Public School serves students from prekindergarten through eighth grade in a rural pocket of McIntosh County, near the town of Eufaula. Because the school stops at grade eight, there is no high school graduation rate to report, and the academic picture available from state testing is thin. Oklahoma’s OSTP assessments were administered for math, English language arts, and science, but nearly all results were suppressed by the state, a common practice when the number of tested students in a grade is very small. The only non-suppressed score came from sixth-grade ELA, where a modest share of students met the proficient or above threshold, a result that leaves a parent with limited information about how most students perform. The school’s overall proficiency index, calculated as the average of the few reported rates across subjects and grades, sits below the midpoint when compared with other districts in McIntosh County.
Enrollment is small, around a hundred students spread across grades PK through eight, with each grade containing roughly a handful to a dozen or so children. The student body is predominantly American Indian or Alaska Native, with White students making up the second-largest group and smaller shares of multiracial, Asian, Hispanic, Black, and Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander students. Data on free and reduced-price meal eligibility, special education services, and English learner status were not available, so economic and support needs are harder to assess from the record alone.
The school is part of the Stidham district, and the district brief turned up no recent parent-relevant changes such as boundary shifts, program launches, or leadership turnover; basic operations appear stable.
Eufaula, where the school’s mailing address is located, is a small lakeside community and the county seat, with an economy rooted in tourism drawn by Lake Eufaula, Oklahoma’s largest lake. The historic downtown has restaurants, shops, a farmers market, and a museum, and the town hosts several annual events. Housing values in the area are below the national median, and home prices have been relatively flat in recent months, which may matter to families considering a move. Residents are served by a regional public transit system, and the town’s civic anchors include the lake itself, nearby state parks, and a community center. Population trends show modest recent growth after earlier declines.
For a family weighing this school, the main considerations are its small size, the rural setting, and the limited academic data available. The school may fit a family seeking a close-knit elementary and middle school environment in a lake-area community where a child would stay through eighth grade before transitioning elsewhere for high school. A parent who wants a clear picture of schoolwide academic performance will find that picture incomplete, and a conversation with the school would be the best way to fill in what the state data does not show.
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