Vista Heights Middle: No single number tells this school's story. Here's the honest picture.
Vista Heights posts 32% meeting the standard and 11.0% 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 | 34 | 11% | 32% | -3.8 | 21.9% | 2.6% |
| CA average · Middle School | 43 | 17% | 39% | +1.5 | 18.5% | 3.7% |
Vista Heights Middle scores 34 of 100 on SchoolScope's Scope Score — the 33rd 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 “32% proficient” and call it done. Vista Heights deserves a closer read. The school sits in Moreno Valley, where four in five students qualify for free or reduced lunch — and reading the numbers without that context misreads the school.
The seven-year arc
Climbed from the 24th to the 33rd percentile of California middle schools since 2019.
Proficiency here is back to its pre-pandemic level — 32% meet the standard, about where the school stood in 2019.
| Grade | 2019 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 6 | 40% | 36% | 33% | 36% | 38% |
| Grade 7 | 39% | 40% | 46% | 39% | 45% |
| Grade 8 | 37% | 39% | 36% | 41% | 39% |
| Grade | 2019 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 6 | 35% | 26% | 24% | 27% | 27% |
| Grade 7 | 26% | 19% | 24% | 20% | 22% |
| Grade 8 | 29% | 19% | 16% | 21% | 19% |
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 falls 3.8pp across grades; the proficiency floor barely moves. 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 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 Vista Heights Middle in Moreno Valley, 38.1% of low-income students met or exceeded the ELA standard in 2025, compared to 33.0% district-wide and 38.2% statewide. Vista Heights Middle outperforms its district average for low-income students by 5.1 percentage points in ELA. Other subgroups: Low-Income students (21.4% Math proficient); Hispanic students (41.9% ELA proficient). The largest proficiency gap is 37.1 percentage points for english learner students. Data source: California Department of Education, CAASPP 2024-25. 1,132 students tested.
6 of 17 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 0.3pp from grade 6 to grade 8 at this school. District average: +0.6pp.
Showing up, and staying in class
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 road from this school ends at Canyon Springs High, which sent 43 graduates to UC campuses last fall and teaches 19 AP subjects. Those numbers describe past cohorts — a child starting here today would reach Canyon Springs High around 2031, and 6 years is a long time for a school to hold still, and by the state's 2023 count 50% of Canyon Springs High's graduates enrolled in college somewhere, UC or not.
The people teaching here
Pay is set by the district, not the school.
What gets spent here
$1,572 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 1,419 students, this school is well above the typical California middle school (≈860).
On the state's science test (CAST), 20% met or exceeded the standard — science is tested in grades 5 and 8 but never enters the Scope Score.
Frequently asked questions
Is Vista Heights Middle a good middle school?
What are Vista Heights Middle's CAASPP test scores?
How does Vista Heights Middle rank in California?
Is Vista Heights Middle getting better or worse?
What is the attendance and school culture like at Vista Heights Middle?
How does Vista Heights Middle compare to other schools in Moreno Valley?
How does Vista Heights Middle serve low-income and underrepresented students?
Your other options
Nearby Elementary Schools
3 within ~3 mi · avg 45
Nearby High 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.
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 | 445 | 13% | 25% | 26% | 36% | 38% | −8 |
| Grade 7 | 474 | 13% | 32% | 27% | 28% | 45% | −3 |
| Grade 8 | 476 | 9% | 29% | 27% | 34% | 39% | −7 |
| Math | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT | MET+ | +/CA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 6 | 445 | 12% | 16% | 27% | 46% | 27% | −8 |
| Grade 7 | 474 | 10% | 12% | 26% | 52% | 22% | −12 |
| Grade 8 | 475 | 9% | 10% | 24% | 57% | 19% | −13 |
| Science (CAST) | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 5/8/11 | 477 | 7% | 13% | 60% | 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 | 1,132 | 38.1% | +5 | −0 |
| Hispanic/Latino | 982 | 41.9% | +7 | +3 |
| Black/African American | 182 | 32.4% | +6 | −0 |
| School | Dist | Scope | EXC | MET+ | Growth | Susp |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Vista Heights Middle ← | — | 34 | 11.0% | 31.8% | −3.8 | 2.6% |
| Sunnymead Middle | 2.6 mi | 22 | 2.8% | 14.8% | −0.9 | 6.7% |
| California average | — | 43 | 16.8% | 39.3% | +1.5 | 3.7% |
| Year | Scope | Pctile | Rank | Exc | Met+ | Absent | Susp | Growth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | 29 | 24 | #1528 | 10.1% | 34.2% | 13.7% | 15.9% | -4.6pp |
| 2022 | 29 | 29 | #1545 | 8.4% | 30.0% | 33.7% | 9.7% | -2.4pp |
| 2023 | 33 | 31 | #1503 | 10.3% | 30.0% | 27.4% | 13.0% | -2.9pp |
| 2024 | 33 | 37 | #1398 | 10.3% | 30.8% | 20.9% | 7.7% | -0.5pp |
| 2025 | 34 | 33 | #1492 | 11.0% | 31.8% | 21.9% | 2.6% | -3.8pp |
| Group | 2019 | 2025 | Δ |
|---|---|---|---|
| Female | 13.3% | 21.8% | +8.5pp |
| Male | 14.2% | 22.1% | +7.9pp |
| Asian | 13.8% | 7.9% | -5.9pp |
| Black/African American | 18.7% | 26.1% | +7.4pp |
| White | 0.0% | 5.0% | +5.0pp |
| Hispanic/Latino | 12.2% | 21.7% | +9.5pp |
| Two or More Races | 20.3% | 30.0% | +9.7pp |
| Students with Disabilities | 21.1% | 32.2% | +11.1pp |
| English Learners | 13.9% | 25.8% | +11.9pp |
| Foster Youth | 12.5% | — | — |
| Homeless | 20.7% | 46.9% | +26.2pp |
| Socioeconomically Disadvantaged | 14.0% | 23.2% | +9.2pp |
| All Students | 13.7% | 21.9% | +8.2pp |
| Filipino | — | 5.6% | — |
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