The top reported proficiency rate is 52% in Social studies. The lowest is 19% in Science.
Original Research by School Decision on Edward E. Taylor Elementary
Edward E. Taylor Elementary serves children from pre-kindergarten through fifth grade in Columbia, South Carolina, as part of the Richland 01 school district. The school is located on McRae Street in the 29203 zip code, a part of the city that sits within Richland County. Columbia itself is the state capital, a city shaped by the presence of state government, the University of South Carolina’s flagship campus downtown, and Fort Jackson, the Army’s largest basic training installation. The city’s downtown core, where the State House and university sit side by side, is the civic and cultural center; beyond it, the city stretches into suburban residential neighborhoods and military lands. The combination gives the broader area a layered character, but Taylor Elementary draws from its own immediate surrounding, which has its own particular set of conditions.
The student body at Taylor Elementary is small. Every student at the school qualifies for free or reduced-price meals, a fact that places the school in a high-poverty context. The racial and ethnic composition is predominantly Black, with a small Hispanic population and a very small number of white students and students of two or more races. The school does not have an enrollment count broken out for students with disabilities or English learners, so a parent interested in those supports would need to ask the school directly about how special education and language services are staffed.
State testing results were reported for the most recent school year, with some grade-level data suppressed, likely because the tested student group was too small to report publicly. Among the results that are available, a picture of modest academic performance emerges. In math, fourth-grade proficiency was in the low range, with fifth-grade scoring somewhat higher. In English language arts, the same pattern held: fourth-grade proficiency was below the midpoint, while fifth-grade proficiency exceeded half of students tested, a stronger relative showing. Science results, available only for fourth grade, were low. Because the state changed its cut scores for both English language arts and science in recent years, comparisons to prior years are not straightforward, and the school has only a single year of current test data, so there is no trend line to assess. On a composite measure of proficiency across all tested subjects and grades, Taylor Elementary placed in the bottom quarter among elementary schools in districts across Richland County. That comparison is limited to the handful of county districts for which data was available, but it suggests that the school’s overall academic performance is below the county average, a soft spot that a parent may want to explore further with the school to understand what supports are in place.
The school’s student-teacher ratio and staffing details were not available. Discipline data and attendance data were also absent. No program offerings—such as gifted and talented, arts, or after-school programs—were listed in the data provided. That lack of detail is a gap; a parent interested in enrichment options, class sizes, or school climate will need to seek that information directly from Taylor Elementary or from Richland 01’s district office.
The district of Richland 01 has no recent publicly reported changes, reorganizations, or notable policy shifts captured in the available records. The housing market in the zip code that serves the school reflects relatively modest home values, with a slight decline year over year, and rent prices are similarly moderate. The national economic context shows a 30-year mortgage rate in the mid-six-percent range and a stable but elevated rent-of-shelter index, conditions that affect family budgets broadly but do not shift the picture of this specific school.
Edward E. Taylor Elementary is a small, high-poverty elementary school in a large city with a complex institutional fabric. Its state test scores, where they are reportable, fall below the middle of the county distribution, with some variability by grade and subject. A parent considering this school would likely want to learn about the specific instructional initiatives, class sizes, and student support systems that the school and district offer, as the available data captures only a partial view.
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