Highland Elementary School

Highland Elementary School, an average-sized elementary-level community in Highland, Illinois, operated by Highland CUSD 5, serves 504 students, covering grades 3 through 5. Compared to the state average of about 381 students per school, that is 32% above typical.

Within Highland CUSD 5, which oversees 6 schools and 2,730 students, Highland Elementary School is one campus in the system.

For racial and ethnic makeup, Highland Elementary School logs that 92% of students identify as White, making the school strongly White-majority; the rest consists of 4% multiracial, 3% Hispanic. The wider county runs roughly 83% White, putting the school's mix meaningfully more White than the area baseline.

On the income-and-resources front, The school lists 35 full-time-equivalent teachers, for a student-teacher ratio near 14.4:1. That tracks the state average closely. Around 31% of the student body qualifies for free or reduced-price meals, which schools and policymakers use as a rough income-mix signal. Set against Madison County (around 46%), the school's rate is meaningfully below typical.

On a demographically-adjusted basis, Highland Elementary School sits in the middle band of the BeatsExpectations distribution. Schools with this campus's student mix typically land near 53.6%; this one delivers 53.8%.

Zooming out to the county, census data for Madison County shows the typical household earns roughly $75,793 per year, roughly 31% of adults have completed at least a four-year degree, and roughly 8% of residents live below the federal poverty line. In all, Madison County runs 84 public schools (combined enrollment of about 35,253 students), of which Highland Elementary School is one.

Highland Primary School is the nearest neighboring public school, about 0.7 miles from this campus. Counting just inside five miles, 3 other public schools cluster around Highland Elementary School. On composite proficiency, Highland Elementary School comes 7th of 8 in the immediate cluster, beneath the nearby-schools average of 61.9%.

Highland Elementary School operates from a small-town location.

Looking at the recent track record. Over the past 7-year window, the student count stayed largely flat: 515 students in 2018 compared to 504 in 2025. The White share of enrollment edged down from 97% to 92% over that span. The student-to-teacher ratio narrowed from 15.8:1 in 2018 to 14.4:1 today.

On the community side, the feed for Highland Elementary School typically covers enrollment questions, classroom assignments, and PTA news. Members of the school community can share what they know.