Durham Elementary

As a moderately sized K-5 school in Durham, California, Durham Elementary hosts 495 students from grades K through 5, overseen by Durham Unified.

Durham Unified runs 3 schools in total, collectively educating 1,048 students. Durham Elementary is one of those campuses.

Demographically, Durham Elementary logs that the largest single group is White, at 69% of enrollment; the rest comes out to 21% Hispanic, 8% multiracial. That composition is broadly in line with Butte County as a whole.

In terms of school funding signals, The school lists 22 full-time-equivalent teachers, for a student-teacher ratio near 22.9:1. That tracks the state average closely. An estimated 38% of students are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch, a commonly cited indicator of low-income enrollment. By comparison, Butte County runs at roughly 63%, so the school's eligibility rate is somewhat below the surrounding baseline.

On a demographically-adjusted basis, Durham Elementary is in the bottom 10% of California public schools. The BeatsExpectations model predicts schools with this FRL share to land around 57.0%; Durham Elementary posts 41.2%, -15.9 points below that line.

In the broader community, community-level numbers for Butte County indicate the typical household earns roughly $67,928 per year, about 32% of the adult population holds a bachelor's degree or above, and census figures put the poverty rate at about 12%. Across Butte County's 96 public schools (combined enrollment of about 29,730 students), Durham Elementary is one campus in the mix.

The closest other public school is Durham Intermediate, roughly 0.1 miles away. Within five miles, there are 3 other public schools. On composite proficiency, Durham Elementary comes 4th of 5 in the immediate cluster, above the nearby-schools average of 39.2%.

The school occupies an outlying site.

Trend over the last 7 years. Over the past 7-year window, the student count held roughly steady: 492 students in 2018 compared to 495 in 2025. The White share of enrollment fell from 74% to 69% over that span.

In the discussion threads here, members of the Durham Elementary community share and discuss open house dates, ride-share offers, and field-trip permission slips. Contributors range from current parents to recent graduates and teachers.