The top reported proficiency rate is 35% in English language arts. The lowest is 26% in Math.
Original Research by School Decision on Patricia S Garza El
Patricia S. Garza Elementary sits on Alberta Road in Donna, a small South Texas city in southeastern Hidalgo County, roughly a short drive east of McAllen along the Expressway 83 corridor. The school is part of Donna ISD and serves children from pre-kindergarten through fifth grade.
The student body is entirely Hispanic, and every enrolled student qualifies for free or reduced-price lunch. English learner data was not available in what we received, but the STAAR assessments administered to younger grades at this school were largely Spanish-language versions, which tells you something about the linguistic environment in the building. These are characteristics of the school's community, not judgments about it.
On academic performance, the picture that emerges from the most recent STAAR results is one of real unevenness and, in several spots, clear room for growth. For grades and subjects where enough students were tested to produce a public result, reading proficiency at the third-grade level came in at roughly half of students tested, while fourth-grade reading and fifth-grade math each landed well below that. Across all tested subjects combined, the school's overall proficiency index places it below the midpoint among districts in Hidalgo County, based on the county comparison set. The share of students reaching the state's higher "masters" performance level across all subjects is quite small. Math shows somewhat stronger approach-grade-level rates than reading, but the fraction of students reaching the "meets" or "masters" thresholds remains low in both. Science and several other grade-subject combinations produced no reportable result because the tested groups were too small to disclose, which reflects the school's enrollment distribution rather than missing data wholesale. A parent wanting to understand trajectory over time will find only a single year of data here, so trend information is not yet available for this school in this dataset.
The school is not large by elementary standards for its grade band, and enrollment is spread fairly evenly across grades once past the primary years. No information on special education rates, chronic absenteeism, or discipline was available in the data we received. Program offerings were also not reported, so we cannot describe whether the school offers bilingual, dual-language, or other specialized instructional models, though the Spanish-language assessment pattern for many grades suggests active bilingual programming; a parent should ask the school directly about this.
The district brief search did not surface confirmed recent changes or strategic priorities for Donna ISD, so we left that out rather than speculate.
The housing market in the Donna area is notably affordable relative to both the Texas state benchmark and national figures. Home values are well below the statewide median and substantially below the national median, and rents run low enough that rent-to-income ratios are modest by most standards. Values have risen modestly year over year. The area is car-dependent, and most families rely on personal vehicles for daily needs, though Valley Metro bus service connects Donna to McAllen. The community is family-oriented and rooted in Mexican-American culture, with Spanish widely spoken. Civic anchors include the Donna Public Library, city parks, a municipal pool, and the downtown area around Donna City Square Park. Growth is gradual, with new subdivisions spreading north and west on former agricultural land and some commercial development along the expressway corridor.
For a family weighing this school, the academics as reported show proficiency rates that fall below both state and county midpoints, and a parent may want to ask the school specifically about reading intervention programs, bilingual support structures, and how student progress is monitored across grades. The community context is one of deep affordability and strong cultural identity, and the school reflects that population directly.
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