The top reported proficiency rate is 33% in Science. The lowest is 24% in English language arts.
Original Research by School Decision on South Kearns School
South Kearns School serves students from preschool through sixth grade in the Granite District, one of the larger school systems in the Salt Lake Valley. The school sits in Kearns, a primarily residential suburb on the western side of the valley that began as a World War II Army air base and later became what is described as the first suburb in Salt Lake County. The built environment is predominantly single-family homes on modest lots laid out on a grid inherited from the former military camp. There is no traditional downtown; community life centers instead around Oquirrh Park, the Utah Olympic Oval, and a recently built library. Transit is bus-based, and most errands require a car.
The student body reflects the surrounding community. Just over half of students identify as Hispanic, with a substantial share of white students, and smaller populations of students who are two or more races, Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander, Black, Asian, or American Indian or Alaska Native. A majority of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch. The school is not a charter or magnet school.
State assessment results for the most recent year show a picture a parent will want to examine directly with the school. On state tests for grades three through eight, the share of students scoring proficient or above was below the midpoint among schools in Salt Lake County. This was true in math and in English language arts, and also in science, though the science results were a bit higher than the other two subjects. The district as a whole participates in the state's RISE assessments, and these results are reported at the school level. The school's overall proficiency index places it in the bottom quarter of schools in the county. For a family considering this school, asking about specific supports for struggling students and how the school is working to raise these numbers would be a natural step.
Kearns itself has seen modest population growth and was officially incorporated as a city only recently, in 2024. Available land for new development is limited because neighboring cities annexed much of the surrounding area earlier, so large-scale future growth is constrained. Housing values in the area run somewhat lower than the state average, consistent with a middle-market suburban community that was built out over several decades starting in the postwar period. The area hosted skating events at the Olympic Oval during the Winter Olympics and will do so again at a future Games, which makes the oval a long-term civic anchor.
The school runs from prekindergarten through sixth grade, so there is no graduation rate to report—that measure applies only to high schools. Because the grade band stops at sixth, there are also no chronic absenteeism figures available in this data. Granite District has its own enrollment patterns and program decisions, but specific recent district-level changes such as bond measures or strategic plans were not located during research, so those are not covered here.
For a family, South Kearns School offers a neighborhood elementary experience in a suburban setting with a diverse student population and a high rate of economic need. The state test results are a soft spot that warrants direct inquiry. The school itself sits within a district that manages a large number of schools, and its community anchor—the Olympic Oval and the park—is an unusual local amenity for a suburb of this kind.
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