Fox River Academy, Appleton WI - Test Scores & Data

Original Research by School Decision on Fox River Academy

Fox River Academy is a public charter school within the Appleton Area School District, serving kindergarten through eighth grade. It operates as a regular school with a charter status, which typically means it has some flexibility in its programming and governance while remaining part of the larger district. The school is located in Appleton, a mixed-use city with a walkable downtown, a diversified economy anchored in healthcare, manufacturing, and education, and a strong cultural scene centered on College Avenue. Appleton is the sixth-largest city in Wisconsin and part of the broader Fox Cities metro area.

The academy is a small school. Its enrollment is modest for a K-8 campus, with roughly comparable numbers of students in each grade from kindergarten through seventh grade and a much smaller eighth-grade class. The student body is predominantly white, with a sizable group identifying as two or more races and a smaller share identifying as Hispanic. Asian and Black students each make up a very small part of the population. A substantial share of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, which is one indicator of economic diversity in a school's population. Data on the share of students receiving special education services or classified as English learners was not available for this report.

On state assessments, the school's performance is strong, landing in the top quartile among districts across Outagamie County when looking at average proficiency across tested subjects and grades. That said, the results vary by grade and subject, and the small size of many tested groups means that a change of one or two students can shift the rates considerably. In third-grade math, a high share of students met or exceeded the state's proficiency standard, and the eighth-grade rates in math, science, and social studies were also very high. Fifth grade showed similarly strong results in both math and English language arts. In other tested grades, the proficiency rates were more mixed. Fourth-grade math and English language arts, sixth-grade math, and eighth-grade English language arts each fell in a moderate range, with about six in ten students scoring proficient or above. A parent may want to look into this further with the school to understand the instructional approach and how the school supports students across different grade levels. Seventh-grade results for both math and English language arts were suppressed in the state data, which is typical when a tested group is very small, so no public data is available for that grade.

Because the school ends at eighth grade, there is no on-site high school programming, no graduation rate, and no course access data for advanced placement, dual credit, or career and technical education pathways. For high school, students would transition into one of the district's high schools, and the academic record from Fox River Academy would be part of that placement context.

The broader Appleton Area School District was searched for recent parent-relevant changes such as referendums, curriculum shifts, boundary changes, or facility decisions, but no specific lasting changes were found. That does not mean none have occurred; rather, the publicly available information did not surface a clear narrative of recent developments.

Housing in the area around the school shows home values that are above the national norm and have been rising. Rents have also increased. For context, the national median household income has been climbing in recent years, though affordability remains a consideration for many families.

Fox River Academy offers a small-school, K-8 setting within a larger district. The academic picture is one of uneven but generally solid testing results, with standout performance in some grades and subjects and middle-of-the-road results in others. Families considering this school should weigh the benefit of a close-knit charter environment against the need to transition to a new high school and should look into how the school addresses the grade-level variations in academic performance. The school's charter status may give it a distinct approach worth exploring directly with the administration.

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Academic performance

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

Math

Grade 392%

School 92% · District 54% · ▲ 38 pts above district

▲ 35 pts above state median · ▲ 36 pts above county median

Grade 465%

School 65% · District 53% · ▲ 13 pts above district

▲ 11 pts above state median · ▲ 4 pts above county median

Grade 586%

School 86% · District 54% · ▲ 32 pts above district

▲ 35 pts above state median · ▲ 29 pts above county median

Grade 662%

School 62% · District 49% · ▲ 12 pts above district

▲ 8 pts above state median · even with county median

Grade 890%

School 90% · District 51% · ▲ 39 pts above district

▲ 39 pts above state median · ▲ 25 pts above county median

English language arts

Grade 379%

School 79% · District 50% · ▲ 30 pts above district

▲ 26 pts above state median · ▲ 25 pts above county median

Grade 461%

School 61% · District 50% · ▲ 11 pts above district

▲ 9 pts above state median · ▲ 5 pts above county median

Grade 586%

School 86% · District 53% · ▲ 32 pts above district

▲ 35 pts above state median · ▲ 25 pts above county median

Grade 677%

School 77% · District 54% · ▲ 23 pts above district

▲ 24 pts above state median · ▲ 9 pts above county median

Grade 860%

School 60% · District 50% · ▲ 10 pts above district

▲ 8 pts above state median · even with county median

Science

Grade 461%

School 61% · District 49% · ▲ 12 pts above district

▲ 9 pts above state median · ▲ 5 pts above county median

Grade 890%

School 90% · District 49% · ▲ 41 pts above district

▲ 39 pts above state median · ▲ 31 pts above county median

Social studies

Grade 474%

School 74% · District 60% · ▲ 14 pts above district

▲ 9 pts above state median · ▲ 7 pts above county median

Grade 880%

School 80% · District 62% · ▲ 18 pts above district

▲ 16 pts above state median · ▲ 9 pts above county median

This schoolAppleton Area School District, 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-income75%Higher-income81%6 pp gap

Grade 4Lower-income50%Higher-income65%15 pp gap

Mathematics

Grade 3Lower-income75%Higher-income100%25 pp gap

Grade 4Lower-income50%Higher-income71%21 pp gap