Creston Elementary

Creston Elementary is one of the micro-enrollment K-5 schools in Creston, California, part of Atascadero Unified, with 61 students on its rolls from grades K through 5. Enrollment runs roughly 87% leaner than the state mean of about 465.

Atascadero Unified runs 12 schools in total, collectively educating 4,355 students. Creston Elementary is one of those campuses.

Looking at the student body, Creston Elementary logs that White students make up the majority at 59%; the rest looks like 26% Hispanic, 11% multiracial. By comparison, San Luis Obispo County as a whole is about 69% White, so the school skews considerably less White than its surroundings.

In terms of school funding signals, Staff filings list 3 full-time-equivalent teachers, which works out to roughly 20.3:1 students per teacher. That figure is tighter than the state norm's 22.3:1 average. Roughly 46% of students at Creston Elementary qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, often used as a Title I proxy.

After controlling for student poverty, Creston Elementary performs roughly as the BeatsExpectations model predicts for a school with this FRL share. The predicted value is around 52.6%, the actual is 44.3%, a residual of -8.4 points.

In the surrounding community, community-level numbers for San Luis Obispo County indicate median household income runs about $97,446, 40% of adults hold a bachelor's degree or higher, and the poverty rate sits near 6%. Creston Elementary is one of 83 public schools in San Luis Obispo County (combined enrollment of about 33,339 students).

Nearest neighbor: Atascadero Choices in Education Academy (ACE), around 7.8 miles off. Within ten miles, there are 8 other public schools, a sparser pattern than typical urban areas. Ranking that nearby cluster on reported proficiency puts Creston Elementary at 3rd of 7; the average score across the group is 42.3%.

Geographically, the school is in an outlying area.

Trend over the last 7 years. Creston Elementary's enrollment has declined 29% since 2018, when it stood at 86 (now 61). Over the same period, the White share ticked down from 67% to 59%. The student-to-teacher ratio fell from 23.2:1 in 2018 to 20.3:1 today.

In the discussion threads here, posts here usually surface around science fair prep, picture-day reminders, and bus-route questions. Anyone with firsthand experience at this school can post or comment.