Valley Oaks Center for Enriched Studies: No single number tells this school's story. Here's the honest picture.
Valley Oaks Center for Enriched Studies posts 19% meeting the standard and 4.3% 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 | 31 | 4% | 19% | -2.8 | 23.7% | 0.2% |
| CA average · Middle School | 43 | 17% | 39% | +1.5 | 18.5% | 3.7% |
Valley Oaks Center for Enriched Studies scores 31 of 100 on SchoolScope's Scope Score — the 26th 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 “19% proficient” and call it done. Valley Oaks Center for Enriched Studies deserves a closer read. The school sits in Sun Valley, where four in five students qualify for free or reduced lunch — and reading the numbers without that context misreads the school.
The headline number: 0.2% suspension rate — versus 3.7% statewide.
The seven-year arc
Climbed from the 2nd to the 26th percentile since 2022 — past roughly 500 middle schools.
| Grade | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 6 | 31% | 32% | 11% | 31% |
| Grade 7 | 38% | 52% | 24% | 22% |
| Grade 8 | 8% | 24% | 37% | 29% |
| Grade 11 | 27% | 32% | 20% | 27% |
| Grade | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 6 | 15% | 4% | 3% | 10% |
| Grade 7 | 12% | 30% | 6% | 15% |
| Grade 8 | 0% | 2% | 12% | 7% |
| Grade 11 | 2% | 3% | 9% | 7% |
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 holds steady across grades; the floor slips 2.1pp. The state average falls 0.5pp 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 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 what changes between grade 6 and grade 8 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 Valley Oaks Center for Enriched Studies in Sun Valley, 26.9% of low-income students met or exceeded the ELA standard in 2025, compared to 40.9% district-wide and 38.2% statewide. Valley Oaks Center for Enriched Studies trails its district average for low-income students by 14.0 percentage points in ELA. Other subgroups: Low-Income students (9.3% Math proficient); Hispanic students (26.9% ELA proficient). The largest proficiency gap is 12.8 percentage points for disabilities students. Data source: California Department of Education, CAASPP 2024-25. 223 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 falls by 6.2pp from grade 6 to grade 8 at this school. District average: -0.3pp.
Showing up, and staying in class
Grades 7–8 students miss school at roughly twice the rate of Grades 4–6 students (27.1% vs 14.3%). Chronic absence here concentrates in the upper grades.
Where the path goes
Valley Oaks Center for Enriched Studies 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
$2,802 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
At 372 students, this school is much smaller than the typical California middle school (≈860).
On the state's science test (CAST), 11% met or exceeded the standard — science is tested in grades 5 and 8 but never enters the Scope Score.
Frequently asked questions
Is Valley Oaks Center for Enriched Studies a good middle school?
What are Valley Oaks Center for Enriched Studies's CAASPP test scores?
How does Valley Oaks Center for Enriched Studies rank in California?
Is Valley Oaks Center for Enriched Studies getting better or worse?
What is the attendance and school culture like at Valley Oaks Center for Enriched Studies?
How does Valley Oaks Center for Enriched Studies compare to other schools in Sun Valley?
How does Valley Oaks Center for Enriched Studies serve low-income and underrepresented students?
Your other options
Nearby Middle Schools
3 within ~3 mi · avg 39
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 | 88 | 8% | 23% | 31% | 39% | 31% | −16 |
| Grade 7 | 67 | 1% | 21% | 33% | 45% | 22% | −25 |
| Grade 8 | 56 | 7% | 21% | 30% | 41% | 29% | −18 |
| Grade 11 | 30 | 7% | 20% | 33% | 40% | 27% | −21 |
| Math | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT | MET+ | +/CA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 6 | 88 | 3% | 7% | 20% | 69% | 10% | −25 |
| Grade 7 | 68 | 4% | 10% | 26% | 59% | 15% | −19 |
| Grade 8 | 59 | 2% | 5% | 15% | 78% | 7% | −26 |
| Grade 11 | 30 | 0% | 7% | 10% | 83% | 7% | −17 |
| Science (CAST) | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 5/8/11 | 89 | 1% | 10% | 69% | 20% |
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 | 223 | 26.9% | −14 | −11 |
| Hispanic/Latino | 219 | 26.9% | −14 | −12 |
| Students with Disabilities | 21 | 14.3% | −2 | −3 |
| School | Dist | Scope | EXC | MET+ | Growth | Susp |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Valley Oaks Center for Enriched Studies ← | — | 31 | 4.3% | 18.9% | −2.8 | 0.2% |
| James Madison Middle | 2.9 mi | 42 | 10.4% | 27.7% | +5.0 | 0.0% |
| Richard E. Byrd Middle | 1.1 mi | 38 | 12.5% | 32.5% | +3.6 | 0.6% |
| Pacoima Middle | 1.8 mi | 36 | 12.4% | 31.8% | −3.0 | 0.7% |
| California average | — | 43 | 16.8% | 39.3% | +1.5 | 3.7% |
| Year | Scope | Pctile | Rank | Exc | Met+ | Absent | Susp | Growth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022 | 13 | 2 | #2118 | 5.7% | 17.2% | 37.9% | 0.1% | -18.9pp |
| 2023 | 33 | 31 | #1516 | 7.6% | 24.1% | 31.9% | 0.1% | -5.1pp |
| 2024 | 30 | 31 | #1525 | 4.3% | 15.4% | 30.3% | 0.3% | +17.3pp |
| 2025 | 31 | 26 | #1660 | 4.3% | 18.9% | 23.7% | 0.2% | -2.8pp |
- — Scored here as a middle school — other grade spans appear in the data appendix.
- — Low-income students here trail the state average for their group by 11 points in ELA — worth asking how the school is closing that gap.
| Group | 2019 | 2025 | Δ |
|---|---|---|---|
| Female | — | 30.2% | — |
| Male | — | 18.3% | — |
| Hispanic/Latino | — | 23.9% | — |
| Students with Disabilities | — | 18.8% | — |
| English Learners | — | 38.8% | — |
| Homeless | — | 75.0% | — |
| Socioeconomically Disadvantaged | — | 23.7% | — |
| All Students | — | 24.0% | — |
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