El Capitan Elementary

Located at 10115 Fifth St., in Delhi, California, El Capitan Elementary is a close-knit elementary-level community that instructs 289 students (grades K through 6), one of the schools within Delhi Unified. By comparison, California's public schools average about 465 students each, so El Capitan Elementary sits 38% leaner than that benchmark.

Within Delhi Unified, which oversees 5 schools and 2,276 students, El Capitan Elementary is one campus in the system.

On the student-mix side, El Capitan Elementary shows that nearly all students (94%) are Hispanic. Beyond that, the school logs 4% White. By comparison, Merced County as a whole is about 63% Hispanic, so the school skews considerably more Hispanic than its surroundings.

In terms of school funding signals, On paper, El Capitan Elementary has 16 full-time-equivalent teachers, translating to a class-load average of around 18.1:1. That figure is tighter than the state norm's 22.3:1 average. Around 91% of the student body qualifies for free or reduced-price meals, a commonly cited indicator of low-income enrollment. By comparison, Merced County runs at roughly 81%, so the school's eligibility rate is higher than the surrounding baseline.

Adjusting for the school's free-and-reduced-lunch share, El Capitan Elementary sits in the middle band of the BeatsExpectations distribution. Schools with this campus's student mix typically land near 25.3%; this one delivers 25.8%.

In the surrounding community, the surrounding county (Merced County) records that median household earnings sit near $65,510, roughly 15% of adults have completed at least a four-year degree, and the poverty rate sits near 16%. El Capitan Elementary is one of 117 public schools in Merced County (combined enrollment of about 59,456 students).

Nearest neighbor: Schendel Elementary, around 0.6 miles off. Within five miles, there are 8 other public schools. On composite proficiency, El Capitan Elementary comes 5th of 9 in the immediate cluster, beneath the nearby-schools average of 28.5%.

The school occupies a small-town site.

Over the past 7-year window. Over the past 7-year window, the student count contracted 4%: 300 students in 2018 compared to 289 in 2025. The student-to-teacher ratio narrowed from 20.0:1 in 2018 to 18.1:1 today.

On the community side, the feed for El Capitan Elementary typically covers school events, parent volunteer needs, and clubs. Members of the school community can share what they know.