The top reported proficiency rate is 21% in English language arts. The lowest is 3% in Science.
Original Research by School Decision on Rodriguez El
Rodriguez Elementary sits on Franklin Park Drive in the 78744 zip code of southeast Austin, serving pre-kindergarten through sixth grade within Austin ISD. The school is small relative to the broader elementary landscape in Travis County, and the enrollment skews heavily toward the early grades. Nearly the entire student body qualifies for free or reduced-price lunch, and the school is overwhelmingly Hispanic in composition, with a small share of Black students and very few students from any other background. English learner counts were not available in the data we reviewed, but the assessment picture offers a clue: a notable portion of tested grades took Spanish-language versions of the STAAR, pointing to a bilingual or dual-language instructional pathway for at least some students.
The academic picture requires careful reading. Texas reports STAAR results across three performance thresholds, and at Rodriguez the headline concern is that "meets grade level" and "masters grade level" rates across all tested subjects sit well below the midpoint of districts in Travis County. Within that, there is meaningful variation by grade and subject. Fifth-grade English language arts shows the strongest results among the grades with reportable data, with roughly two in five students reaching the meets-grade-level bar. Sixth-grade ELA and math are considerably weaker. Third-grade Spanish ELA showed no students reaching proficiency in the tested group, and fifth-grade science proficiency was near zero. Several fourth-grade groups were too small for the state to report results, which reflects the school's modest enrollment rather than suppression for other reasons. Trend data is limited to a single year, so there is no multi-year trajectory available to assess whether performance is improving, holding, or declining. A parent who wants to understand what's behind these numbers, and what supports are in place at the classroom level, would benefit from a direct conversation with school staff.
The broader Austin ISD context matters here. The district is navigating a large budget gap and a decade of enrollment decline. In November 2025 the board approved closing ten schools and reassigning students before the 2026-27 school year, while simultaneously approving state-mandated turnaround plans for campuses with persistently low performance, publicly reported as a condition to avoid state intervention. Rodriguez was among the schools identified in that turnaround process, meaning families should ask the school directly about what changes are planned under that plan and how they affect instruction and staffing. A major bond package approved in 2022 is also funding facility modernizations across the district, with some campuses already rebuilt; whether Rodriguez falls within that capital queue was not available in the data reviewed.
The surrounding zip code housing market shows home values modestly above the Texas statewide median but below the national median, with values having fallen year-over-year as of spring 2026. Rents in the area have also softened slightly. Austin as a whole remains one of the fastest-growing large metros in the country, with continued apartment construction and a major tech and government employer base, though office vacancy has risen and new residential starts slowed in 2024. For a family weighing the neighborhood, southeast Austin is more affordable than the central and northwest parts of the city, generally car-dependent in daily logistics, and at some distance from the walkable core corridors of downtown and South Congress.
Graduation rates do not apply to Rodriguez, which serves only through sixth grade. No course access, chronic absenteeism, or discipline data were available for this profile.
See more original research from School Decision →