SOUTHWEST ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

Located at 2650 SOUTHWEST AVE, in LAKELAND, Florida, SOUTHWEST ELEMENTARY SCHOOL is a cozy K-5 school that instructs 376 students (grades pre-K through 5), operated by POLK. Compared to the state average of about 604 students per school, that is 38% below typical.

SOUTHWEST ELEMENTARY SCHOOL is one of 163 schools operated by POLK, a district that enrolls 116,552 students overall.

For racial and ethnic makeup, SOUTHWEST ELEMENTARY SCHOOL logs that 39% of students identify as Hispanic, with the remaining enrollment distributed across several groups; the rest consists of 33% White, 21% Black, 7% multiracial. By comparison, Polk County as a whole is about 29% Hispanic, so the school skews meaningfully more Hispanic than its surroundings.

On the resource side, The school currently runs with 31 full-time-equivalent teachers, for a student-teacher ratio near 12.1:1. The state averages around 17.5:1, so this campus is tighter than the state norm typical. Roughly 78% of students at SOUTHWEST ELEMENTARY SCHOOL qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, which schools and policymakers use as a rough income-mix signal. That share is above Polk County's rate of about 65%.

On a residual basis (actual vs predicted given the student mix), SOUTHWEST ELEMENTARY SCHOOL performs roughly as the BeatsExpectations model predicts for a school with this FRL share. The predicted value is around 42.3%, the actual is 54.4%, a residual of +12.2 points.

Zooming out to the county, ACS estimates for Polk County put median household income runs about $65,978, about 24% of the adult population holds a bachelor's degree or above, and roughly 11% of residents live below the federal poverty line. Across Polk County's 172 public schools (combined enrollment of about 117,004 students), SOUTHWEST ELEMENTARY SCHOOL is one campus in the mix.

Nearest neighbor: SOUTHWEST MIDDLE SCHOOL, around 0.3 miles off. Within five miles, there are 8 other public schools. Ranking that nearby cluster on reported proficiency puts SOUTHWEST ELEMENTARY SCHOOL at 4th of 8; the average score across the group is 55.4%.

The school occupies a high-density site.

Looking at the recent track record. SOUTHWEST ELEMENTARY SCHOOL's enrollment has contracted 13% since 2018, when it stood at 430 (now 376). Over the same period, the Hispanic share expanded from 28% to 39%. The student-to-teacher ratio fell from 14.8:1 in 2018 to 12.1:1 today.

Within the allk12 community for this school, members of the SOUTHWEST ELEMENTARY SCHOOL community share and discuss classroom updates, athletics, and weather closures. Parents, students, alumni, and staff are welcome to weigh in.