Palms Elementary

As a cozy primary school in Los Angeles, California, Palms Elementary serves 229 students from grades K through 5, one of the schools within Los Angeles Unified. That puts it 51% below the typical public school in California, which averages around 465 students.

Across the 784 schools in Los Angeles Unified (406,887 students total), Palms Elementary accounts for its share of the district's footprint.

For racial and ethnic makeup, Palms Elementary shows that the largest single group is Hispanic, at 59% of enrollment. Beyond that, the school lists 12% Black, 12% Asian, 9% multiracial, 8% White. The wider county runs roughly 48% Hispanic, putting the school's mix visibly more Hispanic than the area baseline.

On the resource side, The school currently runs with 14 full-time-equivalent teachers, for a student-teacher ratio near 16.4:1. Statewide, the average ratio sits near 22.3:1, putting Palms Elementary tighter than the state norm the norm. Around 79% of the student body qualifies for free or reduced-price meals, a commonly cited indicator of low-income enrollment. That share is noticeably above Los Angeles County's rate of about 70%.

Adjusting for the school's free-and-reduced-lunch share, Palms Elementary sits in the middle band of the BeatsExpectations distribution. Schools with this campus's student mix typically land near 32.7%; this one delivers 29.3%.

In the area at large, community-level numbers for Los Angeles County indicate median household earnings sit near $90,112, 36% of adults hold a bachelor's degree or higher, and census figures put the poverty rate at about 10%. Across Los Angeles County's 2244 public schools (combined enrollment of about 1,265,907 students), Palms Elementary is one campus in the mix.

The closest other public school is Palms Middle, roughly 0.5 miles away. Counting just inside five miles, 8 other public schools cluster around Palms Elementary. On composite proficiency, Palms Elementary comes 8th of 8 in the immediate cluster, beneath the nearby-schools average of 58.4%.

The school occupies a city-core site.

Five-year trend. Looking back 7 years, enrollment at Palms Elementary has ticked down 30%, going from 325 students in 2018 to 229 in 2025. Hispanic enrollment moved from 64% to 59% across the same window. The student-to-teacher ratio narrowed from 20.3:1 in 2018 to 16.4:1 today.

In the discussion threads here, the page collects discussion, questions, and updates around open house dates, ride-share offers, and field-trip permission slips. Anyone with firsthand experience at this school can post or comment.