Original Research by School Decision on Double O Elementary School
Double O Elementary School is a very small regular public school serving kindergarten through eighth grade, operated by the Double O School District 28 in rural Harney County, Oregon. The school is located on Double O Road, just outside the town of Hines. Hines is a small, primarily residential community in the high desert of southeastern Oregon, bordering the county seat of Burns. The town was originally a company town for the Edward Hines Lumber Company mill, with a distinctive oval downtown layout and homes built with intentionally varied architecture. The mill has long since closed, and current major employers were not identified in readily available sources, though government and ranching likely play significant roles. The region is shaped by outdoor recreation, including the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge and Steens Mountain.
The school is a key point about this school: its enrollment is tiny. The student population numbers in the low single digits, and all students reported are white, according to the most recent data. There was no data on the share of students who qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, or on students with disabilities or English learners. For a school this size, families should expect multi-grade classrooms and a high degree of individualized instruction, as a single teacher or a very small team covers the full kindergarten-through-eighth-grade span.
This is a school where it is not possible to draw a clear academic picture from state testing data. The most recent state assessment results are largely suppressed or missing, which is common for schools with very small enrollments, as state privacy rules prevent reporting results that could identify individual students. A parent looking at this data will find little to go on regarding proficiency in math, English language arts, or science. The comparison data for the district within Harney County was also not calculable for overall proficiency, graduation rate, or chronic absenteeism for the same reason. A family considering this school would be wise to visit and ask the school directly about its curriculum, student progress, and how it meets the needs of each child across this wide grade span.
There is no graduation rate for this school, as it does not serve high school grades. For high school, students in the area attend Burns High School, which serves both Hines and the broader Harney County School District 3. The Double O School District 28 appears to be a separate, very small district from the larger Harney County School District 3 that serves Hines proper.
The housing market in the area is notably affordable relative to the state and national benchmarks. Typical home values in the area are well below the Oregon state median, and the estimated monthly mortgage payment is also lower. This reflects the rural, remote nature of the region and the economic context of a small town that has experienced slight population decline since its mill days. The median household income in Hines is below the national real median, and the poverty rate is elevated. There were no major new housing developments or recent district-level changes, such as referendums or curriculum shifts, identified for this school or district.
In sum, Double O Elementary School fits a family looking for an extremely small, rural, community-based school where their child would be taught in a mixed-age setting with very limited data on peer performance. Given the lack of state test data and the tiny enrollment, a family would be relying heavily on a direct relationship with the school to understand the academic program. A parent may want to look into this further with the school to understand how instruction is organized and what the school’s own benchmarks for student progress look like.
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