Highlands Elementary: Most kids here clear the bar, year after year. The question is what happens after that.
Highlands posts 57% meeting the standard, and 27.6% 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 | 55 | 28% | 57% | -0.6 | 7.5% | 0.2% |
| CA average · Elementary School | 45 | 21% | 43% | -2.9 | 17.9% | 1.6% |
Highlands 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 →
🤝 Culture First — Ask whether the low absenteeism and suspension numbers come from what the school does or from the community it serves — both can produce the same numbers, and only a visit tells you which.
Most rating sites would stop at “57% proficient” and call it done. Highlands deserves a closer read. The school sits in Saugus, where one in three students qualify for free or reduced lunch — and reading the numbers without that context misreads the school.
Highlands's low-income kids hit 53.1% 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
Has stayed near the 75th percentile since 2019.
The pandemic drop is behind this school: 57% of students meet the standard today, above the 41% who did in 2019.
| Grade | 2019 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 3 | 42% | 62% | 56% | 53% | 60% |
| Grade 4 | 37% | 59% | 58% | 52% | 51% |
| Grade 5 | 60% | 61% | 39% | 59% | 65% |
| Grade 6 | 45% | 56% | 51% | 48% | 75% |
| Grade | 2019 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 3 | 40% | 64% | 56% | 62% | 62% |
| Grade 4 | 30% | 52% | 55% | 48% | 53% |
| Grade 5 | 36% | 53% | 31% | 48% | 55% |
| Grade 6 | 33% | 46% | 46% | 46% | 68% |
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 4.6pp across grades; the floor rises 5.2pp. 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.
Highlands's most underrated number
53.1% 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 Highlands Elementary in Saugus, 53.1% of low-income students met or exceeded the ELA standard in 2025, compared to 57.7% district-wide and 38.2% statewide. Highlands Elementary trails its district average for low-income students by 4.6 percentage points in ELA. Other subgroups: Low-Income students (52.0% Math proficient); Hispanic students (54.9% ELA proficient). The largest proficiency gap is 29.1 percentage points for disabilities students. Data source: California Department of Education, CAASPP 2024-25. 128 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 1.8pp from grade 3 to grade 5 at this school. District average: +5.8pp.
Showing up, and staying in class
TK/K students miss school at roughly twice the rate of Grades 4–6 students (10.4% vs 5.7%). Chronic absence here concentrates in the earliest grades — worth asking how the school works with new families on attendance.
The people teaching here
Pay is set by the district, not the school.
What gets spent here
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), 50% met or exceeded the standard — science is tested in grades 5 and 8 but never enters the Scope Score.
Frequently asked questions
Is Highlands Elementary a good elementary school?
What are Highlands Elementary's CAASPP test scores?
How does Highlands Elementary rank in California?
Is Highlands Elementary getting better or worse?
What is the attendance and school culture like at Highlands Elementary?
How does Highlands Elementary compare to other schools in Saugus?
How does Highlands Elementary serve low-income and underrepresented students?
Your other options
Nearby Elementary Schools
3 within ~3 mi · avg 72
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 | 94 | 29% | 31% | 27% | 14% | 60% | +16 |
| Grade 4 | 83 | 25% | 25% | 27% | 23% | 51% | +6 |
| Grade 5 | 105 | 33% | 31% | 20% | 15% | 65% | +17 |
| Grade 6 | 69 | 41% | 35% | 13% | 12% | 75% | +29 |
| Math | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT | MET+ | +/CA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 3 | 94 | 29% | 33% | 17% | 21% | 62% | +16 |
| Grade 4 | 83 | 17% | 36% | 34% | 13% | 53% | +11 |
| Grade 5 | 105 | 32% | 23% | 30% | 15% | 55% | +20 |
| Grade 6 | 68 | 46% | 22% | 19% | 13% | 68% | +33 |
| Science (CAST) | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 5/8/11 | 105 | 21% | 30% | 39% | 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 | 128 | 53.1% | −5 | +15 |
| Hispanic/Latino | 206 | 54.9% | −4 | +16 |
| White | 104 | 73.1% | +1 | +11 |
| School | Dist | Scope | EXC | MET+ | Growth | Susp |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Highlands Elementary ← | — | 55 | 27.6% | 57.5% | −0.6 | 0.2% |
| Emblem Academy | 0.9 mi | 74 | 50.9% | 76.9% | +1.7 | 0.7% |
| Tesoro del Valle Elementary | 2.8 mi | 71 | 51.8% | 76.6% | +7.3 | 0.9% |
| Charles Helmers Elementary | 1.6 mi | 70 | 51.7% | 75.4% | −3.8 | 0.8% |
| California average | — | 45 | 21.3% | 42.7% | −2.9 | 1.6% |
| Year | Scope | Pctile | Rank | Exc | Met+ | Absent | Susp | Growth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | 53 | 70 | #1629 | 16.7% | 40.9% | 4.1% | 0.6% | +7.3pp |
| 2022 | 53 | 80 | #1145 | 33.7% | 58.4% | 12.2% | 0.1% | -6.2pp |
| 2023 | 40 | 52 | #2723 | 27.3% | 49.1% | 12.3% | 0.2% | -21.7pp |
| 2024 | 48 | 66 | #1975 | 28.6% | 53.8% | 7.3% | 0.6% | -3.5pp |
| 2025 | 55 | 75 | #1433 | 27.6% | 57.5% | 7.5% | 0.2% | -0.6pp |
| Group | 2019 | 2025 | Δ |
|---|---|---|---|
| Female | 2.5% | 4.8% | +2.3pp |
| Male | 5.0% | 8.9% | +3.9pp |
| White | 15.4% | 3.7% | -11.7pp |
| Hispanic/Latino | 4.5% | 7.3% | +2.8pp |
| Students with Disabilities | 7.1% | 10.6% | +3.5pp |
| English Learners | 3.8% | 0.0% | -3.8pp |
| Homeless | 0.0% | 18.8% | +18.8pp |
| Socioeconomically Disadvantaged | 3.1% | 10.7% | +7.6pp |
| All Students | 3.9% | 6.9% | +3.0pp |
| Black/African American | — | 0.0% | — |
| Two or More Races | — | 7.4% | — |
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