Birch Grove Intermediate: Most kids here clear the bar, year after year. The question is what happens after that.
Birch Grove Intermediate posts 60% meeting the standard, and 35.0% going well past it. Most kids here keep up. Fewer get pushed further. Ask the school what it does for a child who already finds the work easy.
| Scope | % Exceeded | % Met+ | Growth | Absence | Suspension | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| This school | 51 | 35% | 60% | -2.5 | 29.4% | 1.6% |
| CA average · Elementary School | 45 | 21% | 43% | -2.9 | 17.9% | 1.6% |
Birch Grove Intermediate scores 51 of 100 on SchoolScope's Scope Score — the 68th percentile of 5,744 California elementary schools (CDE CAASPP 2025).
Measures test performance, attendance, and climate — not arts, community, or your kid. How we score →
🌱 Building Momentum — This label means the data doesn't clearly sort the school one way or the other — ask what the school is proud of, and what it's working on.
Most rating sites would stop at “60% proficient” and call it done. Birch Grove Intermediate deserves a closer read. The school sits in Newark, where one in three students qualify for free or reduced lunch — and reading the numbers without that context misreads the school.
The seven-year arc
Has stayed near the 68th percentile since 2019.
The pandemic drop is behind this school: 60% of students meet the standard today, above the 56% who did in 2019.
| Grade | 2019 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 3 | 58% | 71% | 61% | 63% | 54% |
| Grade 4 | 54% | 48% | 59% | 48% | 71% |
| Grade 5 | 55% | 65% | 54% | 55% | 61% |
| Grade 6 | 53% | 52% | — | — | — |
| Grade | 2019 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 3 | 61% | 71% | 63% | 68% | 60% |
| Grade 4 | 57% | 50% | 57% | 53% | 69% |
| Grade 5 | 51% | 59% | 42% | 44% | 48% |
| Grade 6 | 54% | 43% | — | — | — |
The story this school is actually telling
The school, grade by grade
ELA · CAASPP 2024–25Different students, same year — each bar is one grade's proficiency mix.
The honest read: the share exceeding falls 5.4pp across grades; the floor rises 6.3pp. The state average rises 4.5pp over the same span. A school visit and conversation with teachers will tell you more than this number.
The 6 things our score weighs
Ask how the school challenges kids who clear the standard early. The gap between meeting and exceeding is where pacing shows.
- Ask how the school follows up when a student starts missing days — chronic absence often starts outside the classroom, not inside it.
- Ask what changes between grade 3 and grade 5 here, and who teaches the older kids.
- Ask whether the tour can step into a working classroom — watch how the teacher handles a student who's stuck.
- Ask to tour while school's in session, and notice how hallways and transitions feel — culture shows up between classes, not just in them.
- Ask how the school communicates with families when a child starts to struggle.
- Ask what a typical day looks like for a new student in the first few weeks.
How every group of students does here
At Birch Grove Intermediate in Newark, 42.3% of low-income students met or exceeded the ELA standard in 2025, compared to 33.3% district-wide and 38.2% statewide. Birch Grove Intermediate outperforms its district average for low-income students by 9.0 percentage points in ELA. Other subgroups: Low-Income students (38.5% Math proficient); Hispanic students (42.0% ELA proficient). The largest proficiency gap is 57.3 percentage points for english learner students. Data source: California Department of Education, CAASPP 2024-25. 104 students tested.
6 of 15 student groups here are too small to report — a privacy protection, not a gap.
Change in proficiency from the lowest tested grade — which groups gain ground the longer they stay. Groups with fewer than 10 tested students per grade are not shown.
Low-income student ELA proficiency falls by 1.1pp from grade 3 to grade 5 at this school. District average: +2.5pp.
Showing up, and staying in class
Where the path goes
The path below follows attendance boundaries — scores shown for each next step.
Estimated path based on proximity within the same district. Contact your school district for official feeder information.
The people teaching here
Pay is set by the district, not the school.
What gets spent here
These measure different things: this figure is spending attributed to this campus, while district-wide figures also include central administration, districtwide programs, and the state's pension contributions made on the district's behalf — costs that never get assigned to a single school. The district number runs higher at nearly every school, not just this one.
$46 per student arrives as federal Title funding — a measure of concentrated need, not school quality.
The district's current expense of education per student, from CDE's annual SACS filing — the freshest district spending figure the state publishes.
District-level, from the district's own SACS general-ledger filing — school-by-school breakdowns aren't published by the state.
Source: NCES F-33 · Full district breakdown →
The neighborhood it serves
Source: U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 5-year estimates (2024) · ZIP-level
On the state's science test (CAST), 42% met or exceeded the standard — science is tested in grades 5 and 8 but never enters the Scope Score.
Frequently asked questions
Is Birch Grove Intermediate a good elementary school?
What are Birch Grove Intermediate's CAASPP test scores?
How does Birch Grove Intermediate rank in California?
Is Birch Grove Intermediate getting better or worse?
What is the attendance and school culture like at Birch Grove Intermediate?
How does Birch Grove Intermediate compare to other schools in Newark?
How does Birch Grove Intermediate serve low-income and underrepresented students?
Your other options
Nearby Elementary Schools
3 within ~3 mi · avg 69
Nearby Middle Schools
3 within ~3 mi · avg 60
Nearby High Schools
3 within ~3 mi · avg 66
Private alternatives nearby
Private schools within ~10 miles. These schools do not participate in state testing and cannot be scored or ranked.
Every number on this page
Score factors, grade-level breakdowns, subgroup proficiency, and peer comparisons.
| ELA | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT | MET+ | +/CA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 3 | 103 | 37% | 17% | 21% | 24% | 54% | +11 |
| Grade 4 | 86 | 44% | 27% | 13% | 16% | 71% | +26 |
| Grade 5 | 89 | 31% | 29% | 22% | 17% | 61% | +13 |
| Math | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT | MET+ | +/CA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 3 | 104 | 38% | 22% | 17% | 23% | 60% | +14 |
| Grade 4 | 86 | 34% | 35% | 19% | 13% | 69% | +27 |
| Grade 5 | 91 | 26% | 22% | 29% | 23% | 48% | +13 |
| Science (CAST) | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 5/8/11 | 92 | 17% | 25% | 48% | 10% |
CAST is tested in grades 5, 8, and once in high school — not annually. Not part of the Scope Score.
| Subgroup · ELA | Tested | MET+ | vs district | vs CA |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Socioeconomically Disadvantaged | 104 | 42.3% | +9 | +4 |
| Hispanic/Latino | 88 | 42.0% | +7 | +3 |
| Asian | 87 | 69.0% | +0 | −5 |
| School | Dist | Scope | EXC | MET+ | Growth | Susp |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Birch Grove Intermediate ← | — | 51 | 35.0% | 60.4% | −2.5 | 1.6% |
| Ardenwood Elementary | 3.1 mi | 73 | 58.3% | 81.4% | +2.5 | 0.6% |
| Parkmont Elementary | 2.7 mi | 67 | 50.6% | 73.5% | −0.9 | 0.9% |
| Forest Park Elementary | 2.5 mi | 66 | 45.3% | 70.6% | −5.9 | 0.3% |
| California average | — | 45 | 21.3% | 42.7% | −2.9 | 1.6% |
| Year | Scope | Pctile | Rank | Exc | Met+ | Absent | Susp | Growth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | 53 | 71 | #1624 | 33.6% | 56.2% | 3.4% | 2.6% | -6.6pp |
| 2022 | 53 | 81 | #1116 | 34.6% | 60.5% | 14.0% | 1.1% | -8.9pp |
| 2023 | 53 | 77 | #1337 | 33.7% | 56.2% | 16.1% | 0.9% | -14.0pp |
| 2024 | 45 | 57 | #2469 | 33.2% | 55.3% | 25.1% | 1.8% | -15.5pp |
| 2025 | 51 | 68 | #1824 | 35.0% | 60.4% | 29.4% | 1.6% | -2.5pp |
| Group | 2019 | 2025 | Δ |
|---|---|---|---|
| Female | 2.4% | 29.1% | +26.7pp |
| Male | 4.1% | 30.9% | +26.8pp |
| Asian | 1.0% | 19.4% | +18.4pp |
| Black/African American | 12.5% | 63.6% | +51.1pp |
| White | 1.6% | 5.7% | +4.1pp |
| Hispanic/Latino | 5.8% | 38.4% | +32.6pp |
| Two or More Races | 0.0% | 40.9% | +40.9pp |
| Students with Disabilities | 4.7% | 40.0% | +35.3pp |
| English Learners | 4.5% | 40.0% | +35.5pp |
| Homeless | 3.8% | 53.3% | +49.5pp |
| Socioeconomically Disadvantaged | 5.0% | 42.4% | +37.4pp |
| All Students | 3.3% | 30.0% | +26.7pp |
| Filipino | — | 40.0% | — |
SchoolScope scores and verdicts are our interpretation of public California Department of Education data — independent analysis, not an official rating. How we analyze · Request a correction