Vista de Las Cruces: Most kids here clear the bar, year after year. The question is what happens after that.
Vista de Las Cruces posts 68% meeting the standard, and 27.3% 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 | 57 | 27% | 68% | — | 19.1% | 1.6% |
| CA average · Elementary School | 45 | 21% | 43% | -2.9 | 17.9% | 1.6% |
Vista de Las Cruces scores 57 of 100 on SchoolScope's Scope Score — the 78th 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 →
🏫 Solid Base — Ask what the school does for a kid who's already meeting the standard with room to spare — steady proficiency across the board doesn't tell you whether the strongest kids are being pushed further.
Most rating sites would stop at “68% proficient” and call it done. Vista de Las Cruces deserves a closer read. The school sits in Gaviota, where two in five students qualify for free or reduced lunch — and reading the numbers without that context misreads the school.
The 4 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 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.
Showing up, and staying in class
Grades 7–8 students miss school at roughly three times the rate of Grades 4–6 students (38.5% vs 8.7%). Chronic absence here concentrates in the upper grades.
The people teaching here
Pay is set by the district, not the school.
What gets spent here
These measure different things: this figure is spending attributed to this campus, while district-wide figures also include central administration, districtwide programs, and the state's pension contributions made on the district's behalf — costs that never get assigned to a single school. The district number runs higher at nearly every school, not just this one.
$155 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 65 students, this school is much smaller than the typical California elementary school (≈480).
Transitional kindergarten is offered here — confirmed by actual Census Day enrollment, not just the listed grade span.
On the state's science test (CAST), 44% met or exceeded the standard — science is tested in grades 5 and 8 but never enters the Scope Score.
Frequently asked questions
Is Vista de Las Cruces a good elementary school?
What are Vista de Las Cruces's CAASPP test scores?
How does Vista de Las Cruces rank in California?
What is the attendance and school culture like at Vista de Las Cruces?
How does Vista de Las Cruces compare to other schools in Gaviota?
Your other options
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 | 11 | 36% | 27% | 18% | 18% | 64% | +20 |
| Grade 4 | 6 | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Grade 5 | 10 | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Grade 6 | 7 | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Grade 7 | 5 | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Grade 8 | 8 | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Math | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT | MET+ | +/CA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 3 | 11 | 18% | 55% | 27% | 0% | 73% | +27 |
| Grade 4 | 6 | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Grade 5 | 10 | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Grade 6 | 7 | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Grade 7 | 5 | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Grade 8 | 8 | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Science (CAST) | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 5/8/11 | 18 | 11% | 33% | 33% | 22% |
CAST is tested in grades 5, 8, and once in high school — not annually. Not part of the Scope Score.
| School | Dist | Scope | EXC | MET+ | Growth | Susp |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Vista de Las Cruces ← | — | 57 | 27.3% | 68.2% | — | 1.6% |
| California average | — | 45 | 21.3% | 42.7% | −2.9 | 1.6% |
- — Growth data isn't available — the state needs matched grades across years to compute it.
- — Subgroup results are suppressed for small student counts (fewer than 15 tested), following CDE privacy rules.
- — Scored here as an elementary school — other grade spans appear in the data appendix.
| Group | 2019 | 2025 | Δ |
|---|---|---|---|
| Female | 21.1% | 16.2% | -4.9pp |
| Male | 21.2% | 25.8% | +4.6pp |
| Hispanic/Latino | 20.0% | 36.4% | +16.4pp |
| Students with Disabilities | 25.0% | — | — |
| English Learners | 15.4% | — | — |
| Socioeconomically Disadvantaged | 25.9% | 33.3% | +7.4pp |
| All Students | 21.2% | 20.6% | -0.6pp |
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