McKay Elem School

McKay Elem School is a primary school of heavily attended scale in Chicago, Illinois, operated by Chicago Public Schools Dist 299, hosting 616 students in grades pre-K through 8. That puts it 62% larger than the typical public school in Illinois, which averages around 381 students.

Chicago Public Schools Dist 299 comprises 622 schools with combined enrollment of 324,396 students; McKay Elem School is among them.

For racial and ethnic makeup, McKay Elem School shows that the most-represented group is Hispanic (52%), with the rest of the student body spread across multiple groups. Other groups include 45% Black. That is considerably more Hispanic than the county at large, where the share is closer to 27%.

In terms of school funding signals, The school employs 45 full-time-equivalent teachers, for a student-teacher ratio near 13.8:1. The state averages about 13.9:1, putting this campus right in line with peers. Around 97% of the student body qualifies for free or reduced-price meals, which schools and policymakers use as a rough income-mix signal. That share is noticeably above Cook County's rate of about 66%.

Adjusting for the school's free-and-reduced-lunch share, McKay Elem School performs roughly as the BeatsExpectations model predicts for a school with this FRL share. The predicted value is around 15.6%, the actual is 14.0%, a residual of -1.6 points.

Zooming out to the county, ACS estimates for Cook County put the typical household earns roughly $83,498 per year, roughly 43% of adults have completed at least a four-year degree, and roughly 10% of residents live below the federal poverty line. In all, Cook County runs 1406 public schools (combined enrollment of about 697,934 students), of which McKay Elem School is one.

The closest other public school is ACE Amandla Charter School, roughly 0.1 miles away. Counting just inside five miles, 8 other public schools cluster around McKay Elem School. Ranking that nearby cluster on reported proficiency puts McKay Elem School at 7th of 9; the average score across the group is 19.4%.

McKay Elem School operates from a downtown location.

Five-year trend. Over the past 7-year window, the student count declined 23%: 801 students in 2018 compared to 616 in 2025. Over the same period, the Black share ticked down from 76% to 45%. The student-to-teacher ratio tightened from 20.5:1 in 2018 to 13.8:1 today.

On allk12, members of the McKay Elem School community share and discuss school events, parent volunteer needs, and clubs. Parents, students, alumni, and staff are welcome to weigh in.