The top reported proficiency rate is 67% in Science. The lowest is 57% in English language arts.
Original Research by School Decision on Cloud Peak Elementary
Cloud Peak Elementary sits in Buffalo, the county seat of Johnson County, Wyoming, serving grades three through five as part of Johnson County School District #1. The school is one of four distinct campuses in the district's Buffalo feeder system, taking over where Meadowlark Elementary (K through 2) leaves off and feeding into Clear Creek Middle School and then Buffalo High School. It is a traditional public school, not a charter or magnet, and it operates on its own campus separate from the downtown core.
Buffalo is a small town built on a mix of agriculture, tourism tied to its Wild West heritage and proximity to the Bighorn Mountains, and energy production. The coal bed methane boom that once drove growth has declined, and the population has stabilized. The downtown retains a frontier character anchored by the Occidental Hotel and Saloon, the Jim Gatchell Memorial Museum, and Crazy Woman Square, which hosts a free summer concert series and a Wednesday farmers market. Schools sit on their own campuses away from that civic core, and the low-density, wide-street layout means most daily errands outside downtown require a car. The town sits at the junction of Interstates 25 and 90, with Lake De Smet and Bighorn National Forest nearby for outdoor recreation. Key employers include the school district itself, the Veterans' Home of Wyoming, agriculture-related businesses, and tourism operations.
Academic results at Cloud Peak are a real strength. On the WY-TOPP assessment, math proficiency rises steadily across the three grade levels, with a clear majority of students meeting or exceeding proficiency benchmarks in each grade. Fifth grade posts the strongest math result. English language arts proficiency is solid as well, with roughly half to nearly two-thirds of students proficient, and the strongest showing in fourth grade. Science, tested only in fourth grade at this school, also shows a healthy majority of students reaching proficiency. Participation rates are high across every grade and subject, nearly universal, which gives the results weight. The school does not serve high school grades, so there is no graduation rate to report, and that absence reflects the grade band rather than any gap in performance. No multi-year trend data was available, so it is not possible to say from this data whether these results represent improvement or a stable pattern.
The student body is small for its grade band, which is consistent with Buffalo's population. It is overwhelmingly white, with a small number of students identifying as American Indian or Alaska Native and a handful representing two or more races; other racial or ethnic groups have minimal or no representation. About a third of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, a moderate share that suggests a community with some economic need but not concentrated poverty. Data on students with individualized education programs and English learners was not available, so those population shares cannot be characterized here. A parent wanting to understand special education or language services may want to look into this further with the school or district.
Housing in the area runs above both the state and national benchmarks for typical home values, with the typical home value in the school's zip code sitting moderately higher than the Wyoming statewide figure. Estimated monthly mortgage costs reflect current elevated interest rates. Rent data was not available. The price-to-income ratio sits below the national average, suggesting that relative to earnings, housing here is more attainable than in many parts of the country. No specific new housing developments were identified in available sources.
Because Johnson County contains only a single district, the county-level comparison set is too small to generate meaningful peer benchmarks for proficiency, graduation, or absenteeism. So there is no neighbor comparison to draw on here; the academic picture stands on its own from the state assessment results.
No data on staffing, discipline, attendance, chronic absenteeism, course access, or Title I status was available, so those dimensions of school environment cannot be described. The district brief also turned up little in the way of recently reported changes or initiatives that would be parent-relevant. What the available data does show is a small upper-elementary school with consistent, above-average proficiency across reading, math, and science, situated in a stable rural county seat with a distinct Western identity and reasonable housing affordability relative to income. For a family in Buffalo with children entering third through fifth grade, that is the core of the picture.
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