Williston Schools, Williston VT - Test Scores & Data

Original Research by School Decision on Williston Schools

Williston Schools is a public pre-kindergarten through eighth-grade school in Williston, Vermont, part of the Champlain Valley Unified Union School District. It is a large single campus for its grade band, serving a broad span of ages under one roof. Because the school tops out at eighth grade, there is no graduation rate to report, and that is simply a function of the grade range, not a missing indicator of quality.

The student body is predominantly white, with small representation from Asian, Hispanic, Black, and multiracial students. About a fifth of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, which is a relatively modest share. Data on individualized education programs and English learner status was not available, so those counts are left out rather than guessed.

On Vermont's statewide assessment, English language arts is where Williston Schools reads strongest. Proficiency is above half in every tested grade from third through eighth, and it climbs into solid territory in the upper grades. Eighth-grade ELA is the highest result in the building. The pattern suggests the school is doing steady work building literacy that compounds over time.

Math results are more uneven. Third grade starts at a moderate level, but fourth and fifth grade dip, with proficiency sitting below half in fifth grade before rebounding strongly in sixth and seventh. Eighth grade settles back to roughly the middle. The dip in the upper elementary years is a soft spot that stands out against the otherwise consistent ELA picture, and a parent may want to look into this further with the school, especially if their child is approaching those grades. Science, tested only in fifth and eighth grade, lands at about half proficient in fifth and somewhat higher in eighth.

The comparison fact-set places Williston among districts in Chittenden County, but the cohort for proficiency indexing was too small to produce a usable comparison, so there is no neighbor benchmark to report. Chronic absenteeism data was also not available.

Housing in Williston sits well above both the Vermont state benchmark and the national benchmark for typical home values. The price-to-income ratio is elevated, meaning a family earning a median income would find ownership here a stretch relative to most of the country. Rent data for the area was not available. At current mortgage rates, the estimated monthly cost of ownership is high, and the gap between renting and owning is wide. This is an affluent-area housing market, and the relatively low free-or-reduced-price-lunch share at the school is consistent with that picture.

Several categories that would help round out the portrait are absent. No staffing data, course access information, discipline records, or attendance figures were provided. Program offerings were not listed, so there is no way to describe extracurriculars, enrichment, or specialized pathways from the available material. The locale brief and district brief were also not included, so there is no sourced community context or recent district-level change narrative to draw on here.

What the data does show is a school with a sizable enrollment for its grade band, a student body that is relatively economically advantaged, and an academic profile that is stronger in literacy than in math. The ELA results, particularly in the upper grades, are a clear positive. The math dip in fourth and fifth grade is the main area a family might probe further. For a parent weighing this school, the academic signal through middle school is generally solid in reading and mixed in math, set in a community where housing costs run high.

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Academic performance

How students perform on state tests, by grade, set against the district.

Math

Grade 352%

School 52% · district not reported

▲ 19 pts above state median · ▲ 6 pts above county median

Grade 442%

School 42% · district not reported

▲ 13 pts above state median · ▲ 2 pts above county median

Grade 540%

School 40% · district not reported

▲ 5 pts above state median · ▼ 7 pts below county median

Grade 664%

School 64% · district not reported

▲ 19 pts above state median · even with county median

Grade 762%

School 62% · district not reported

▲ 20 pts above state median · even with county median

Grade 850%

School 50% · district not reported

▲ 17 pts above state median · ▲ 2 pts above county median

English language arts

Grade 360%

School 60% · district not reported

▲ 14 pts above state median · ▲ 1 pts above county median

Grade 474%

School 74% · district not reported

▲ 19 pts above state median · ▲ 12 pts above county median

Grade 562%

School 62% · district not reported

▲ 14 pts above state median · even with county median

Grade 674%

School 74% · district not reported

▲ 21 pts above state median · even with county median

Grade 774%

School 74% · district not reported

▲ 15 pts above state median · ▲ 1 pts above county median

Grade 879%

School 79% · district not reported

▲ 20 pts above state median · ▲ 10 pts above county median

Science

Grade 550%

School 50% · district not reported

▲ 6 pts above state median · ▼ 2 pts below county median

Grade 860%

School 60% · district not reported

▲ 21 pts above state median · ▲ 3 pts above county median

This schoolDistrict average, same grade

Graduation rate (ACGR) reflects the federally published Adjusted Cohort Graduation Rate for the most recent year available. We refresh this data annually at the close of each academic year in June. The federal source publishes a banded rate (for example, "90-94%") instead of an exact number for cohorts small enough to risk identifying individual students. The state distribution chart, where shown, plots every school in the state with a published rate or band; schools whose rate is federally suppressed are excluded. Where the federal source publishes a band rather than an exact rate, the school is placed within its band using a stable, ID-derived offset, so its position is consistent across visits.

Proficiency by household income

English language arts

Grade 3Lower-income19%Higher-income68%50 pp gap

Grade 4Lower-income61%Higher-income79%18 pp gap

Grade 5Lower-income44%Higher-income66%22 pp gap

Grade 6Lower-income44%Higher-income83%39 pp gap

Grade 7Lower-income46%Higher-income82%37 pp gap

Grade 8Lower-income65%Higher-income81%16 pp gap

Mathematics

Grade 3Lower-income6%Higher-income62%56 pp gap

Grade 4Lower-income29%Higher-income46%18 pp gap

Grade 5Lower-income19%Higher-income44%26 pp gap

Grade 6Lower-income48%Higher-income69%21 pp gap

Grade 7Lower-income32%Higher-income70%39 pp gap

Grade 8Lower-income24%Higher-income54%31 pp gap