CICS - West Belden Campus

CICS - West Belden Campus operates as a medium-sized primary school in Chicago, Illinois, overseen by Chicago Public Schools Dist 299. Current enrollment sits at 520 students spanning grades K through 8. Enrollment runs roughly 36% bigger than the state mean of about 381.

Across the 622 schools in Chicago Public Schools Dist 299 (324,396 students total), CICS - West Belden Campus accounts for its share of the district's footprint.

On the student-mix side, CICS - West Belden Campus logs that the student body is overwhelmingly Hispanic (91%). The remainder looks like 7% Black. That is meaningfully more Hispanic than the county at large, where the share is closer to 27%.

On the income-and-resources front, Staff filings list 33 full-time-equivalent teachers, which works out to roughly 15.9:1 students per teacher. The state averages around 13.9:1, so this campus is higher than the state norm typical. About 87% of enrolled students meet the income threshold for free or reduced-price lunch, often used as a Title I proxy. That share is higher than Cook County's rate of about 66%.

On a residual basis (actual vs predicted given the student mix), CICS - West Belden Campus performs roughly as the BeatsExpectations model predicts for a school with this FRL share. The predicted value is around 21.1%, the actual is 25.0%, a residual of +3.9 points.

In the surrounding community, community-level numbers for Cook County indicate median household income runs about $83,498, 43% of adults hold a bachelor's degree or higher, and the poverty rate sits near 10%. Across Cook County's 1406 public schools (combined enrollment of about 697,934 students), CICS - West Belden Campus is one campus in the mix.

The closest other public school is Belmont-Cragin Elem School, roughly 0.2 miles away. 8 of the 8 nearest public schools sit inside a five-mile radius. Ranking that nearby cluster on reported proficiency puts CICS - West Belden Campus at 6th of 9; the average score across the group is 25.8%.

CICS - West Belden Campus operates from a downtown location. CICS - West Belden Campus operates as a public charter school, meaning it is publicly funded but governed independently of the surrounding district's traditional schools.

Trend over the last 7 years. Looking back 7 years, enrollment at CICS - West Belden Campus has remained close to its prior level, going from 527 students in 2018 to 520 in 2025.

On this page, recent activity here tends to focus on science fair prep, picture-day reminders, and bus-route questions. Contributors range from current parents to recent graduates and teachers.