Pond Elementary

Pond Elementary is an elementary school of tiny scale in Wasco, California, one of the schools within Pond Union Elementary, enrolling 175 students in grades K through 8. That puts it 62% leaner than the typical public school in California, which averages around 465 students.

Pond Union Elementary is the operating authority for Pond Elementary, handling staffing, calendars, and reporting to the state department of education.

Demographically, Pond Elementary records that nearly all students (91%) are Hispanic; the rest consists of 5% White, 2% multiracial. The wider county runs roughly 57% Hispanic, putting the school's mix noticeably more Hispanic than the area baseline.

On the income-and-resources front, On paper, Pond Elementary has 10 full-time-equivalent teachers, translating to a class-load average of around 17.2:1. That figure is tighter than the state norm's 22.3:1 average. An estimated 96% of students are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch, which schools and policymakers use as a rough income-mix signal. Set against Kern County (around 76%), the school's rate is meaningfully above typical.

After controlling for student poverty, Pond Elementary performs roughly as the BeatsExpectations model predicts for a school with this FRL share. The predicted value is around 22.3%, the actual is 24.1%, a residual of +1.8 points.

Across the wider county, the surrounding county (Kern County) logs that median household income runs about $70,210, roughly 19% of adults have completed at least a four-year degree, and roughly 15% of residents live below the federal poverty line. Pond Elementary is one of 279 public schools in Kern County (combined enrollment of about 197,431 students).

Pioneer is the nearest neighboring public school, about 4.2 miles from this campus. 5 of the 8 nearest public schools sit inside a five-mile radius. Ranking that nearby cluster on reported proficiency puts Pond Elementary at 6th of 7; the average score across the group is 37.8%.

The campus sits in a small-town setting.

Five-year trend. Over the past 7-year window, the student count decreased 9%: 193 students in 2018 compared to 175 in 2025. Class-load math has tightened: from 21.4:1 in 2018 to 17.2:1 in 2025.

On this page, the feed for Pond Elementary typically covers open house dates, ride-share offers, and field-trip permission slips. Contributors range from current parents to recent graduates and teachers.