Cottage Hill Elementary

Cottage Hill Elementary is a K-5 school of middle-of-the-pack scale in Grass Valley, California, operated by Pleasant Ridge Union Elementary, serveing 485 students in grades K through 5.

Pleasant Ridge Union Elementary runs 4 schools in total, collectively educating 1,440 students. Cottage Hill Elementary is one of those campuses.

In terms of who attends, Cottage Hill Elementary reports that White students make up the majority at 68%. Other groups include 17% Hispanic, 12% multiracial. That is noticeably less White than the county at large, where the share is closer to 84%.

In terms of school funding signals, Staff filings list 21 full-time-equivalent teachers, which works out to roughly 23.1:1 students per teacher. That figure is higher than the state norm's 22.3:1 average. Around 35% of the student body qualifies for free or reduced-price meals, which schools and policymakers use as a rough income-mix signal. That share is noticeably below Nevada County's rate of about 43%.

After controlling for student poverty, Cottage Hill Elementary performs roughly as the BeatsExpectations model predicts for a school with this FRL share. The predicted value is around 58.8%, the actual is 45.5%, a residual of -13.3 points.

Zooming out to the county, census data for Nevada County shows the typical household earns roughly $89,882 per year, 42% of adults hold a bachelor's degree or higher, and the poverty rate sits near 7%. In all, Nevada County runs 46 public schools (combined enrollment of about 13,561 students), of which Cottage Hill Elementary is one.

Magnolia Intermediate is the nearest neighboring public school, about 0.1 miles from this campus. Counting just inside five miles, 6 other public schools cluster around Cottage Hill Elementary. Ranking that nearby cluster on reported proficiency puts Cottage Hill Elementary at 6th of 8; the average score across the group is 47.6%.

Geographically, the school is in a low-density area.

Trend over the last 7 years. Looking back 7 years, enrollment at Cottage Hill Elementary has rose 17%, going from 415 students in 2018 to 485 in 2025. The White share of enrollment decreased from 77% to 68% over that span. Class-load math has loosened: from 21.8:1 in 2018 to 23.1:1 in 2025.

Inside the community feed, the feed for Cottage Hill Elementary typically covers science fair prep, picture-day reminders, and bus-route questions. Anyone with firsthand experience at this school can post or comment.