Butler Elem School

Located at 1701 S MacArthur Blvd, in Springfield, Illinois, Butler Elem School is a mid-tier primary school that caters to 367 students (grades K through 5), overseen by Springfield SD 186.

Across the 31 schools in Springfield SD 186 (13,014 students total), Butler Elem School accounts for its share of the district's footprint.

On demographics, Butler Elem School logs that the most-represented group is White (40%), with the rest of the student body spread across multiple groups; the rest looks like 40% Black, 14% multiracial, 2% Hispanic. The wider county runs roughly 78% White, putting the school's mix visibly less White than the area baseline.

On the income-and-resources front, Staff filings list 27 full-time-equivalent teachers, which works out to roughly 13.8:1 students per teacher. That tracks the state average closely. An estimated 57% of students are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch, a number frequently used as a low-income enrollment indicator. Set against Sangamon County (around 48%), the school's rate is somewhat above typical.

On a demographically-adjusted basis, Butler Elem School performs roughly as the BeatsExpectations model predicts for a school with this FRL share. The predicted value is around 38.6%, the actual is 42.5%, a residual of +3.8 points.

In the broader community, census data for Sangamon County shows the typical household earns roughly $75,357 per year, about 37% of the adult population holds a bachelor's degree or above, and census figures put the poverty rate at about 9%. In all, Sangamon County runs 77 public schools (combined enrollment of about 27,345 students), of which Butler Elem School is one.

Nearest neighbor: Benjamin Franklin Middle School, around 0.6 miles off. Counting just inside five miles, 8 other public schools cluster around Butler Elem School. Among the 8 schools in that immediate cluster with test data (this one included), Butler Elem School ranks 3rd on composite proficiency, higher than the local average of 29.2%.

The campus sits in a city-core setting.

Looking at the recent track record. Butler Elem School's enrollment has fell 10% since 2018, when it stood at 406 (now 367). White enrollment moved from 44% to 40% across the same window. Class-load math has fell: from 17.5:1 in 2018 to 13.8:1 in 2025.

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