Garden Grove Elementary: The score is strong. The trajectory is stronger.
Garden Grove pairs 45% proficiency with gains that hold up when the same students are tracked two years apart — the rare school that posts both.
| Scope | % Exceeded | % Met+ | Growth | Absence | Suspension | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| This school | 55 | 18% | 45% | +5.1 | 18.4% | 1.4% |
| CA average · Elementary School | 45 | 21% | 43% | -2.9 | 17.9% | 1.6% |
Garden Grove Elementary scores 55 of 100 on SchoolScope's Scope Score — the 75th 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 →
🚀 Growth Engine — Ask how the school tracks each kid's growth year to year, and what happens when a kid stalls instead of gaining.
Most rating sites would stop at “45% proficient” and call it done. Garden Grove deserves a closer read. The school sits in Simi Valley, where more than half of students qualify for free or reduced lunch — and reading the numbers without that context misreads the school.
The headline number: +5.1pp separates this year's grade 3 from its grade 5. The state average rises 4.5pp over the same span. Following the same students from 2023 G3 → 2025 G5 points the same way.
The seven-year arc
Climbed from the 59th to the 75th percentile since 2019 — past roughly 800 elementary schools.
This school hasn't fully recovered from the pandemic: 45% meet the standard today, versus 49% in 2019 — a gap worth asking about on a visit.
| Grade | 2019 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 3 | 56% | 44% | 44% | 58% | 48% |
| Grade 4 | 55% | 33% | 38% | 53% | 44% |
| Grade 5 | 52% | 55% | 52% | 59% | 58% |
| Grade 6 | 38% | 42% | 29% | 40% | — |
| Grade | 2019 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 3 | 44% | 49% | 37% | 29% | 48% |
| Grade 4 | 49% | 31% | 43% | 51% | 25% |
| Grade 5 | 39% | 39% | 35% | 37% | 49% |
| Grade 6 | 52% | 29% | 19% | 40% | — |
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 rises 14.6pp across grades; the floor rises 9.6pp. The state average rises 4.5pp over the same span. Kids here gain ground the longer they stay — the pattern you want to see. A school visit and conversation with teachers will tell you more than this number.
The 6 things our score weighs
Ask what changed — new curriculum, new principal, new program. Momentum has a cause, and a visit will find it.
- Ask how teachers track each child's growth over the year, not just where the class lands on test day.
- 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 Garden Grove Elementary in Simi Valley, 40.8% of low-income students met or exceeded the ELA standard in 2025, compared to 38.9% district-wide and 38.2% statewide. Garden Grove Elementary outperforms its district average for low-income students by 1.9 percentage points in ELA. Other subgroups: Low-Income students (28.6% Math proficient); Hispanic students (46.9% ELA proficient). The largest proficiency gap is 9.8 percentage points for low-income students. Data source: California Department of Education, CAASPP 2024-25. 76 students tested.
7 of 14 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 rises by 2.4pp from grade 3 to grade 5 at this school. District average: +6.9pp.
Showing up, and staying in class
Grades 4–6 students miss school at roughly one and a half times the rate of TK/K students (20.6% vs 12.5%). 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
$194 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
Transitional kindergarten is offered here — confirmed by actual Census Day enrollment, not just the listed grade span.
On the state's science test (CAST), 35% met or exceeded the standard — science is tested in grades 5 and 8 but never enters the Scope Score.
Frequently asked questions
Is Garden Grove Elementary a good elementary school?
What are Garden Grove Elementary's CAASPP test scores?
How does Garden Grove Elementary rank in California?
Is Garden Grove Elementary getting better or worse?
What is the attendance and school culture like at Garden Grove Elementary?
How does Garden Grove Elementary compare to other schools in Simi Valley?
How does Garden Grove Elementary serve low-income and underrepresented students?
Your other options
Nearby Elementary Schools
3 within ~3 mi · avg 60
Nearby Middle Schools
2 within ~3 mi · avg 36
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 | 31 | 19% | 29% | 29% | 23% | 48% | +5 |
| Grade 4 | 32 | 13% | 31% | 34% | 22% | 44% | −1 |
| Grade 5 | 50 | 34% | 24% | 18% | 24% | 58% | +10 |
| Math | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT | MET+ | +/CA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 3 | 31 | 13% | 35% | 16% | 35% | 48% | +3 |
| Grade 4 | 32 | 0% | 25% | 41% | 34% | 25% | −17 |
| Grade 5 | 51 | 29% | 20% | 29% | 22% | 49% | +14 |
| Science (CAST) | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 5/8/11 | 51 | 18% | 18% | 57% | 8% |
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 | 76 | 40.8% | +2 | +3 |
| Hispanic/Latino | 64 | 46.9% | +9 | +8 |
| White | 16 | 62.5% | +5 | +1 |
| School | Dist | Scope | EXC | MET+ | Growth | Susp |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Garden Grove Elementary ← | — | 55 | 18.0% | 45.4% | +5.1 | 1.4% |
| Vista Elementary | 1.3 mi | 70 | 46.3% | 75.3% | −10.6 | 0.7% |
| Big Springs Elementary | 1.9 mi | 61 | 29.8% | 59.6% | −16.5 | 0.1% |
| Crestview Elementary | 2.1 mi | 50 | 21.9% | 53.7% | −7.6 | 0.9% |
| California average | — | 45 | 21.3% | 42.7% | −2.9 | 1.6% |
| Year | Scope | Pctile | Rank | Exc | Met+ | Absent | Susp | Growth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | 46 | 59 | #2251 | 24.9% | 49.2% | 11.1% | 2.0% | -4.3pp |
| 2022 | 41 | 62 | #2186 | 14.3% | 41.9% | 32.6% | 2.4% | +1.2pp |
| 2023 | 44 | 61 | #2233 | 16.0% | 41.4% | 30.2% | 2.8% | +3.1pp |
| 2024 | 49 | 67 | #1916 | 19.3% | 47.8% | 22.4% | 1.6% | +4.0pp |
| 2025 | 55 | 75 | #1436 | 18.0% | 45.4% | 18.4% | 1.4% | +5.1pp |
| Group | 2019 | 2025 | Δ |
|---|---|---|---|
| Female | 12.6% | 15.8% | +3.2pp |
| Male | 9.7% | 20.6% | +10.9pp |
| Asian | 6.3% | — | — |
| Hispanic/Latino | 11.0% | 20.9% | +9.9pp |
| Students with Disabilities | 20.7% | 31.3% | +10.6pp |
| English Learners | 12.0% | 26.8% | +14.8pp |
| Homeless | 9.1% | 22.2% | +13.1pp |
| Socioeconomically Disadvantaged | 14.1% | 19.3% | +5.2pp |
| All Students | 11.1% | 18.4% | +7.3pp |
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