Magnolia Science Academy 4: No single number tells this school's story. Here's the honest picture.
Magnolia Science Academy 4 posts 34% meeting the standard and 10.4% exceeding it, against 39% and 16.8% statewide. The gaps and the bright spots below are the real read.
| Scope | % Exceeded | % Met+ | Growth | Absence | Suspension | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| This school | 36 | 10% | 34% | — | 25.1% | 1.6% |
| CA average · Middle School | 43 | 17% | 39% | +1.5 | 18.5% | 3.7% |
Magnolia Science Academy 4 scores 36 of 100 on SchoolScope's Scope Score — the 37th 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 “34% proficient” and call it done. Magnolia Science Academy 4 deserves a closer read. The school sits in Los Angeles, where four in five students qualify for free or reduced lunch — and reading the numbers without that context misreads the school.
Magnolia Science Academy 4's low-income kids hit 64.1% 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.
As a charter, Magnolia Science Academy 4 enrolls by application rather than address. That changes how you get in, but it doesn't change the score.
The seven-year arc
Climbed from the 17th to the 37th percentile since 2019 — past roughly 300 middle schools.
The pandemic drop is behind this school: 34% of students meet the standard today, above the 15% who did in 2019.
| Grade | 2019 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 6 | 17% | — | — | 53% | — |
| Grade 7 | — | — | — | 33% | 65% |
| Grade 8 | 32% | — | — | — | 36% |
| Grade 11 | 33% | 38% | 44% | 48% | 63% |
| Grade | 2019 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 6 | 8% | — | — | 13% | — |
| Grade 7 | — | — | — | 17% | 18% |
| Grade 8 | 5% | — | — | — | 18% |
| Grade 11 | 10% | 25% | 11% | 16% | 19% |
Magnolia Science Academy 4's most underrated number
64.1% 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 4 things our score weighs
Ask what the school is working on next. Strong numbers tell you where a school is, not where it's going.
- Ask how the school follows up when a student starts missing days — chronic absence often starts outside the classroom, not inside it.
- 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 Magnolia Science Academy 4 in Los Angeles, 64.1% of low-income students met or exceeded the ELA standard in 2025, compared to 40.9% district-wide and 38.2% statewide. Magnolia Science Academy 4 outperforms its district average for low-income students by 23.2 percentage points in ELA. Other subgroups: Low-Income students (17.9% Math proficient); Hispanic students (61.5% ELA proficient). Data source: California Department of Education, CAASPP 2024-25. 39 students tested.
8 of 12 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.
Showing up, and staying in class
Where the path goes
Magnolia Science Academy 4 serves grades 6-12 — students can complete middle and high school here, without a separate middle-to-high transition.
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
At 132 students, this school is much smaller than the typical California middle school (≈860).
On the state's science test (CAST), 21% met or exceeded the standard — science is tested in grades 5 and 8 but never enters the Scope Score.
Frequently asked questions
Is Magnolia Science Academy 4 a good school?
It's in the Developing band, at the 41.94 percentile statewide (SchoolScope Scope Score, 2024-25 (see /methodology)). About 40.7% of students meet or exceed standard on CAASPP [caaspp]. That's a moderate record, and it's complicated by two things: math scores are weak and only one AP course is offered [courses]. The school does staffing well and keeps discipline incidents rare, but the academic picture underneath the overall number is uneven.
Does Magnolia Science Academy 4 live up to what it says about itself?
The school describes itself as a 'high-quality, college-preparatory STEAM' program with 'science labs, robotics projects and competitions' that helps ALL students access rigorous coursework. Some of that holds up. It says it provides a safe, nurturing community, and the suspension rate (1.7% [suspension]) backs that up. But the STEAM and rigor claims are harder to square with the numbers: only 1 AP course is offered [courses], science proficiency is 21.1% met or exceeded [science], and grade 7 math sits at 17.6% [caaspp]. The school also says it supports ALL students with embedded help for those below grade level, but Hispanic/Latino students score 2.3 points below the school average [caaspp], a modest but real gap against an 'all students' promise. Worth asking directly on a visit: which subject does that single AP course cover, and how does it connect to the STEAM label the school leads with?
How much should I trust these numbers?
Read them carefully. Enrollment here is just 132 students across grades 6-12, so each tested grade is a small group, and one class can swing a percentage a lot. That matters directly: grade 7 ELA sits at 64.7% met or exceeded while grade 7 math is 17.6% in the same year (CDE CAASPP, 2024-25) [caaspp]. That's a real gap worth asking about, but it could reflect this specific cohort as much as a lasting pattern in how math is taught here. Treat every rate on this page as a snapshot, not a trend.
Who is actually teaching at Magnolia Science Academy 4?
Teachers here average 6.7 years of experience, none are in their first year, and 93.8% are fully credentialed [staff]. That describes a stable, experienced staffing situation. It isn't a rating of how good any individual teacher is — it just tells you the school isn't relying heavily on brand-new hires.
What can my student actually take here?
Right now, one AP course [courses]. That's a real limit on how far a student can go in advanced coursework at this specific campus, separate from how the school scores on proficiency tests. If a broad AP lineup matters to your family, ask the school directly which course it is and whether it lines up with the STEAM focus it advertises.
What's daily life like for students here?
Suspensions are rare, at 1.7% [suspension], which points to a campus without frequent discipline incidents. Chronic absenteeism is a different story: 29.6% of students miss enough school to be counted chronically absent. That's about engagement or access to school day-to-day, not safety. What's actually driving it — transportation, health, motivation — isn't something attendance data can tell you. That's a fair question for a campus visit.
What's the story behind Magnolia Science Academy 4?
MPS opened Magnolia Science Academy 4 in the fall of 2008, as part of the Magnolia Public Schools network built around a STEAM focus.
What we found when we looked closer
Magnolia Science Academy 4 sits in the Developing band, at the 41.94 percentile statewide (SchoolScope Scope Score, 2024-25 (see /methodology)), with 40.7% of students meeting or exceeding standard on CAASPP [caaspp]. That's a moderate record, and the number alone hides a real split in how the school is doing.
Start with what's working. Teachers here average 6.7 years of experience, none are first-year, and 93.8% are fully credentialed [staff]. Suspensions are rare, at 1.7% [suspension]. That's a stable, experienced staff running a campus without frequent discipline problems — a real foundation, even if it doesn't show up in a proficiency score.
Now the school's own words. It describes itself as providing a 'high-quality, college-preparatory STEAM educational experience,' one that challenges students through 'science labs, robotics projects and competitions,' with rigor made accessible to 'ALL students,' including those below grade level. Some of that matches the record: the safe, nurturing climate it claims lines up with the low suspension rate. But the STEAM and rigor claims run into real numbers. The school currently offers just 1 AP course [courses] — a hard constraint on advanced coursework no matter how the classroom itself feels. Science proficiency stands at 21.1% met or exceeded [science]. Grade 7 math sits at 17.6% [caaspp]. Those numbers don't disprove the ambition behind the STEAM label, but they don't confirm it either, and a family drawn in by that language should ask specifically what STEAM looks like in practice here: which labs run, how often, and in which grades.
The 'ALL students' claim has its own wrinkle. Hispanic/Latino students here score 2.3 points below the school average [caaspp], a small but measurable shortfall against a promise of equal access to rigor. With only one year of data on hand, there's no way to tell whether that's a persistent pattern or something specific to this year's cohort.
That cohort-size caution matters everywhere on this page. Enrollment is 132 students across grades 6-12 [enrollment], which means every tested grade is small. Grade 7 ELA comes in at 64.7% met or exceeded, while grade 7 math in the same year sits at 17.6% [caaspp] — a striking gap between two subjects tested in the same classroom of kids. That could be a real, subject-specific weakness in how math is taught here, or it could be the kind of swing a single strong or weak class produces in a small school. There's no way to tell from this data alone which one it is, and it's the single best question to bring to a school visit.
Outside the numbers, the school's story is straightforward: Magnolia Public Schools opened MSA4 in fall 2008 as part of its STEAM-focused network. What that founding vision looks like today, in a single AP course and a 21% science proficiency rate, is something only a walk through the actual classrooms can answer.
Written by SchoolScope from Magnolia Science Academy 4’s own website and California Department of Education data, checked 2026-08-08· How we do this · Who we are
Sources (14)
- msa4.magnoliapublicschools.org — home
- msa4.magnoliapublicschools.org/apps/pages/index.jsp?type=d&uREC_ID=388323 — about
- msa4.magnoliapublicschools.org/apps/cross.jsp?crossPath=%2Fapps%2Fpages%2Findex.jsp%3FuREC — safety
- msa4.magnoliapublicschools.org/apps/cross.jsp?crossPath=%2Fapps%2Fpages%2Findex.jsp%3FuREC — safety
- msa4.magnoliapublicschools.org/apps/departments/clubs.jsp — activities
- msa4.magnoliapublicschools.org/apps/pages/index.jsp?pREC_ID=539447&type=d&uREC_ID=286205 — enrollment
- msa4.magnoliapublicschools.org/apps/pages/index.jsp?type=d&uREC_ID=286141 — principal
- msa4.magnoliapublicschools.org/apps/pages/index.jsp?type=d&uREC_ID=355300 — academics
- msa4.magnoliapublicschools.org/apps/pages/index.jsp?type=d&uREC_ID=379608 — academics
- msa4.magnoliapublicschools.org/apps/pages/index.jsp?type=d&uREC_ID=388652 — supports
- msa4.magnoliapublicschools.org/apps/pages/index.jsp?type=d&uREC_ID=581159 — academics
- msa4.magnoliapublicschools.org/apps/news/show_news.jsp?id=0&REC_ID=604870 — supports
Your other options
Nearby Middle Schools
3 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.
A low score doesn't tell the whole story. Read: Your School Scored Low — Here's What That Actually Means
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 | 10 | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Grade 7 | 17 | 18% | 47% | 29% | 6% | 65% | +17 |
| Grade 8 | 11 | 18% | 18% | 27% | 36% | 36% | −10 |
| Grade 11 | 27 | 15% | 48% | 19% | 19% | 63% | +16 |
| Math | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT | MET+ | +/CA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 6 | 10 | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Grade 7 | 17 | 6% | 12% | 35% | 47% | 18% | −16 |
| Grade 8 | 11 | 0% | 18% | 36% | 45% | 18% | −14 |
| Grade 11 | 27 | 4% | 15% | 33% | 48% | 19% | −5 |
| Science (CAST) | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 5/8/11 | 38 | 5% | 16% | 74% | 5% |
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 | 39 | 64.1% | +23 | +26 |
| Hispanic/Latino | 26 | 61.5% | +21 | +23 |
| School | Dist | Scope | EXC | MET+ | Growth | Susp |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Magnolia Science Academy 4 ← | — | 36 | 10.4% | 34.2% | — | 1.6% |
| ICEF Vista Middle Academy | 2.6 mi | 65 | 25.8% | 60.9% | +12.9 | 0.7% |
| Mark Twain Middle | 2.2 mi | 56 | 29.7% | 52.5% | −16.4 | 0.6% |
| John Adams Middle | 2.3 mi | 53 | 28.2% | 56.0% | −2.8 | 3.0% |
| California average | — | 43 | 16.8% | 39.3% | +1.5 | 3.7% |
| Year | Scope | Pctile | Rank | Exc | Met+ | Absent | Susp | Growth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | 26 | 17 | #1673 | 1.3% | 15.5% | 19.0% | 7.1% | +5.9pp |
| 2024 | 32 | 35 | #1445 | 9.2% | 29.2% | 28.1% | 1.9% | — |
| 2025 | 36 | 37 | #1414 | 10.4% | 34.2% | 25.1% | 1.6% | — |
- — Growth data isn't available — the state needs matched grades across years to compute it.
- — Scored here as a middle school — other grade spans appear in the data appendix.
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