The top reported proficiency rate is 50% in Math. The lowest is 45% in English language arts.
Original Research by School Decision on Cascade Locks School
Cascade Locks School serves kindergarten through fifth grade in the small, scenic mountain village of Cascade Locks, a tight-knit Columbia River community of modest size where tourism, recreation, and the Port are the primary economic anchors. The school is part of Hood River County School District, which in summer 2025 discussed placing a bond measure on the November ballot to fund a new athletic complex at the district's high school, a facilities investment that would not raise the tax rate because existing bond debt is rolling off.
The school itself is small, and the student body reflects the community's demographics. About half the students are white, roughly a quarter are Hispanic, and a notable share identify as two or more races. A substantial share of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch. Because the school serves only early elementary grades, it does not have a graduation rate, and state testing data covers only the tested grades within its span.
On state assessments in the most recent school year, results were mixed by grade level. In third grade, the share of students meeting proficiency in both math and English language arts was below the midpoint of what a family might hope to see, with roughly a third of students reaching that bar in each subject. In fourth grade, performance was notably stronger. Roughly two-thirds of students met proficiency in math, and just over half did so in English language arts. Fifth grade results for math, English language arts, and science were suppressed, so no data is available for that grade. Across all tested grades, the combined proficiency rate for English language arts stood near the middle, while the combined math proficiency rate was slightly below it. The available data offers only a single year of results, so there is no trend to point to.
No program offerings or course access data were reported, and the school's Title I status was not available. Discipline, staffing, and attendance information were also absent from the data provided. A parent may want to ask the school directly about special education services, English learner supports, class sizes, and enrichment offerings, as none of those were present in the record.
The neighborhood comparison could not position Cascade Locks School relative to other districts in Hood River County because the county has only one district, making that comparison set too small to produce meaningful results. Housing in the area is somewhat more affordable than the state median, though it still represents a substantial commitment relative to national income benchmarks. The village itself is quiet and stable, with no signs of rapid growth or new development pressure that would dramatically reshape the community in the near term.
For a family looking at Cascade Locks School, the picture is one of a very small elementary school in a small, close-knit mountain town, with uneven but sometimes strong state test results in the grades where data is available. The lack of information on several key dimensions of school life means that a parent considering this school would benefit from visiting, talking to staff, and asking about the areas where the public data is silent. The school serves only the elementary years, so a family would also need to plan for what comes next in the district for middle and high school.
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