Erle Stanley Gardner Middle: Most kids here clear the bar, year after year. The question is what happens after that.
Erle Stanley Gardner posts 56% meeting the standard, and 27.5% 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 | 27% | 56% | -0.4 | 14.0% | 4.6% |
| CA average · Middle School | 43 | 17% | 39% | +1.5 | 18.5% | 3.7% |
Erle Stanley Gardner Middle scores 51 of 100 on SchoolScope's Scope Score — the 73rd percentile of 2,238 California middle 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 “56% proficient” and call it done. Erle Stanley Gardner deserves a closer read. The school sits in Temecula, where one in three students qualify for free or reduced lunch — and reading the numbers without that context misreads the school.
Erle Stanley Gardner's low-income kids hit 53.2% proficiency in ELA — a number the same group reaches at 38.2% statewide. If you're trying to read past zip-code-driven test scores, that's the signal worth weighing.
The seven-year arc
Slipped from the 86th to the 73rd percentile since 2019.
This school hasn't fully recovered from the pandemic: 56% meet the standard today, versus 68% in 2019 — a gap worth asking about on a visit.
| Grade | 2019 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 6 | 74% | 69% | 60% | 70% | 59% |
| Grade 7 | 76% | 70% | 70% | 66% | 71% |
| Grade 8 | 71% | 69% | 72% | 73% | 60% |
| Grade | 2019 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 6 | 66% | 50% | 44% | 57% | 46% |
| Grade 7 | 58% | 51% | 56% | 48% | 53% |
| Grade 8 | 66% | 48% | 50% | 56% | 44% |
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 1.7pp across grades; the proficiency floor barely moves. The state average falls 0.5pp over the same span. A school visit and conversation with teachers will tell you more than this number.
Erle Stanley Gardner's most underrated number
53.2% of low-income students met the ELA standard — versus 38.2% for the same group statewide. That's the strongest kind of signal a school can post: it holds across income lines.
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 whether extra support — tutoring, counseling, small groups — reaches kids across income lines, not just the students already ahead.
- 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 Erle Stanley Gardner Middle in Temecula, 53.2% of low-income students met or exceeded the ELA standard in 2025, compared to 52.8% district-wide and 38.2% statewide. Erle Stanley Gardner Middle outperforms its district average for low-income students by 0.4 percentage points in ELA. Other subgroups: Low-Income students (38.6% Math proficient); Hispanic students (52.6% ELA proficient). The largest proficiency gap is 52.3 percentage points for disabilities students. Data source: California Department of Education, CAASPP 2024-25. 362 students tested.
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 5.1pp from grade 6 to grade 8 at this school. District average: +2.6pp.
Showing up, and staying in class
Grades 7–8 students miss school at roughly one and a half times the rate of Grades 4–6 students (15.9% vs 9.9%). Chronic absence here concentrates in the upper grades.
Where the path goes
The path below follows attendance boundaries — scores shown for each next step.
Feeder patterns derived from NCES attendance boundary data. Boundaries are approximate and may have changed — verify with your school district for current assignments.
The people teaching here
Pay is set by the district, not the school.
What gets spent here
$552 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), 45% met or exceeded the standard — science is tested in grades 5 and 8 but never enters the Scope Score.
Frequently asked questions
Is Erle Stanley Gardner Middle a good middle school?
What are Erle Stanley Gardner Middle's CAASPP test scores?
How does Erle Stanley Gardner Middle rank in California?
Is Erle Stanley Gardner Middle getting better or worse?
What is the attendance and school culture like at Erle Stanley Gardner Middle?
How does Erle Stanley Gardner Middle compare to other schools in Temecula?
How does Erle Stanley Gardner Middle serve low-income and underrepresented students?
Your other options
Nearby Middle Schools
2 within ~3 mi · avg 58
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 6 | 318 | 26% | 33% | 23% | 18% | 59% | +13 |
| Grade 7 | 321 | 28% | 43% | 17% | 12% | 71% | +23 |
| Grade 8 | 324 | 24% | 36% | 20% | 19% | 60% | +14 |
| Math | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT | MET+ | +/CA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 6 | 317 | 29% | 18% | 29% | 25% | 46% | +11 |
| Grade 7 | 324 | 30% | 23% | 23% | 23% | 53% | +19 |
| Grade 8 | 326 | 28% | 16% | 27% | 29% | 44% | +12 |
| Science (CAST) | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 5/8/11 | 324 | 22% | 23% | 48% | 7% |
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 | 362 | 53.2% | +0 | +15 |
| Hispanic/Latino | 348 | 52.6% | −3 | +14 |
| White | 307 | 71.9% | +4 | +10 |
| School | Dist | Scope | EXC | MET+ | Growth | Susp |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Erle Stanley Gardner Middle ← | — | 51 | 27.5% | 55.8% | −0.4 | 4.6% |
| Temecula Middle | 2.3 mi | 66 | 32.6% | 63.2% | +11.1 | 2.6% |
| Vail Ranch Middle | 2 mi | 50 | 25.3% | 57.8% | −10.1 | 4.9% |
| California average | — | 43 | 16.8% | 39.3% | +1.5 | 3.7% |
| Year | Scope | Pctile | Rank | Exc | Met+ | Absent | Susp | Growth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | 59 | 86 | #279 | 35.7% | 68.5% | 9.9% | 2.6% | -1.6pp |
| 2022 | 52 | 80 | #428 | 26.9% | 59.4% | 15.5% | 5.3% | -1.0pp |
| 2023 | 60 | 85 | #319 | 26.9% | 58.5% | 13.0% | 6.9% | +8.9pp |
| 2024 | 59 | 86 | #308 | 30.3% | 61.6% | 10.4% | 4.8% | +0.8pp |
| 2025 | 51 | 73 | #613 | 27.5% | 55.8% | 14.0% | 4.6% | -0.4pp |
| Group | 2019 | 2025 | Δ |
|---|---|---|---|
| Female | 8.7% | 16.5% | +7.8pp |
| Male | 11.1% | 11.5% | +0.4pp |
| Asian | 2.5% | 7.3% | +4.8pp |
| Black/African American | 2.8% | 19.2% | +16.4pp |
| White | 5.3% | 7.8% | +2.5pp |
| Hispanic/Latino | 13.6% | 15.5% | +1.9pp |
| American Indian/Alaska Native | 20.8% | 33.3% | +12.5pp |
| Two or More Races | 5.2% | 15.0% | +9.8pp |
| Students with Disabilities | 17.4% | 18.6% | +1.2pp |
| English Learners | 12.1% | 20.5% | +8.4pp |
| Socioeconomically Disadvantaged | 17.3% | 20.8% | +3.5pp |
| All Students | 9.9% | 13.9% | +4.0pp |
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