Saratoga Elementary, Saratoga WY

Original Research by School Decision on Saratoga Elementary

Saratoga Elementary sits in a small rural town along the Upper North Platte River, ringed by the Snowy Range and Sierra Madre mountains. The town's identity is tied to outdoor recreation: free public mineral hot springs, blue-ribbon trout fishing, a national fish hatchery, and Saratoga Lake a short drive north. Publicly reported sources describe a compact Main Street core with restaurants and small businesses, a community center redeveloped from an old school building, and a public library branch. The largest employers are the U.S. Forest Service and the school district itself, with healthcare anchored by the North Platte Valley Medical Center and a local clinic. Growth has been slow and steady, with no major new housing developments identified. Home values sit below both the state and national benchmarks, and the housing market reads as affordable relative to income. There is no public transit; the town sits south of Interstate 80 and is car-dependent for practical travel.

The school serves kindergarten through sixth grade with a small total enrollment. The student body is predominantly white, with a smaller Hispanic presence and a few students from other racial backgrounds. Just over a quarter of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch. Data on English learners and special education populations was not reported, so those figures are absent here rather than interpretable.

Academic results come from Wyoming's WY-TOPP assessment. The picture is uneven across grade levels. Third grade stands out as a bright spot, with strong proficiency in both math and English language arts. Sixth grade is similarly strong, with a clear majority of students reaching proficiency in both subjects. Fifth grade lands around the middle, with roughly half of students proficient in ELA and a smaller share in math. Fourth grade is the soft spot: proficiency drops sharply in both math and ELA, and science proficiency for that grade sits in the same lower range. A parent may want to look into this further with the school, particularly whether a cohort effect or a curricular transition is at play. Because the grade-level cohorts are small, year-to-year results can swing more than they would in a larger school.

Relative to districts in Carbon County, Saratoga Elementary's overall proficiency across tested subjects and grades sits above the midpoint. The comparison set is small, limited to the county's districts, so this positioning is modest but positive. Multi-year trend data was not available, so it is not possible to say whether these results represent improvement, decline, or stability over time.

Because Saratoga Elementary does not serve high school grades, there is no graduation rate to report. Chronic absenteeism data was also not available. No information on Title I status, discipline, course access, staffing, or attendance was provided.

The school offers a range of athletics for an elementary program, including basketball, cross country, football, track and field, volleyball, and wrestling. These are available across the grade band the school serves. Program details beyond athletics were not included in the available data.

The district, Carbon County School District #2, had no parent-relevant changes identified in recent search results. The search turned up little of lasting impact, so there is nothing to report on strategic shifts, facility changes, or policy moves.

For a family considering Saratoga, the school offers a small-setting elementary experience with solid results in the lower and upper elementary grades, a clear dip in the middle grades worth asking about, and an athletic program unusual for a school this size. The community is rural, recreation-oriented, and affordable by housing standards, with civic life centered on Main Street, the riverfront, and the schools themselves.

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Academic performance

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

Math

Grade 384%

School 84% · District 63% · ▲ 21 pts above district

▲ 24 pts above state median

Grade 427%

School 27% · District 39% · ▼ 12 pts below district

▼ 31 pts below state median

Grade 542%

School 42% · District 59% · ▼ 17 pts below district

▼ 16 pts below state median

Grade 671%

School 71% · District 74% · ▼ 2 pts below district

▲ 18 pts above state median

English language arts

Grade 374%

School 74% · District 59% · ▲ 15 pts above district

▲ 21 pts above state median

Grade 436%

School 36% · District 41% · ▼ 4 pts below district

▼ 16 pts below state median

Grade 550%

School 50% · District 57% · ▼ 6 pts below district

▼ 10 pts below state median

Grade 671%

School 71% · District 67% · ▲ 5 pts above district

▲ 12 pts above state median

Science

Grade 442%

School 42% · District 54% · ▼ 11 pts below district

▼ 14 pts below state median

This schoolCarbon County School District #2, 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-income67%Higher-income77%10 pp gap

Grade 4Lower-income40%Higher-income35%5 pp gap

Grade 5Lower-income38%Higher-income56%19 pp gap

Grade 6Lower-income56%Higher-income83%28 pp gap

Mathematics

Grade 4Lower-income20%Higher-income30%10 pp gap