Lawndale Elem Community Academy

Located at 3500 W Douglas Blvd, in Chicago, Illinois, Lawndale Elem Community Academy is a tight-knit elementary-level community that teaches 191 students (grades pre-K through 8), part of Chicago Public Schools Dist 299. By comparison, Illinois's public schools average about 381 students each, so Lawndale Elem Community Academy sits 50% below that benchmark.

Lawndale Elem Community Academy is one of 622 schools operated by Chicago Public Schools Dist 299, a district that caters to 324,396 students overall.

For racial and ethnic makeup, Lawndale Elem Community Academy lists that nearly all students (86%) are Black. The remainder looks like 14% Hispanic. By comparison, Cook County as a whole is about 22% Black, so the school skews meaningfully more Black than its surroundings.

Looking at the economic backdrop, The school lists 18 full-time-equivalent teachers, for a student-teacher ratio near 10.5:1. The state averages around 13.9:1, so this campus is tighter than the state norm typical. An estimated 81% of students are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch, a commonly cited indicator of low-income enrollment. That share is higher than Cook County's rate of about 66%.

Adjusting for the school's free-and-reduced-lunch share, Lawndale Elem Community Academy falls in the UNDERPERFORMING tier of the BeatsExpectations residual. Given its student profile, a typical campus would land near 24.9%; this one comes in at 8.2%, -16.8 points off the demographic line.

Around the school, census data for Cook County shows median household income runs about $83,498, roughly 43% of adults have completed at least a four-year degree, and roughly 10% of residents live below the federal poverty line. Lawndale Elem Community Academy is one of 1406 public schools in Cook County (combined enrollment of about 697,934 students).

The closest other public school is Herzl Elem School, roughly 0.3 miles away. Within five miles, there are 8 other public schools. On composite proficiency, Lawndale Elem Community Academy comes 7th of 9 in the immediate cluster, beneath the nearby-schools average of 14.5%.

The school occupies an urban site.

Five-year trend. Over the past 7-year window, the student count fell 27%: 262 students in 2018 compared to 191 in 2025. Black enrollment moved from 98% to 86% across the same window. The student-to-teacher ratio fell from 19.6:1 in 2018 to 10.5:1 today.

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