Parkside Jr High School

Located at 101 N Parkside Rd, in Normal, Illinois, Parkside Jr High School is a middle-of-the-pack middle-grades school that works with 598 students (grades 6 through 8), overseen by McLean County USD 5. Enrollment runs roughly 29% above the state mean of about 462.

Across the 24 schools in McLean County USD 5 (12,407 students total), Parkside Jr High School accounts for its share of the district's footprint.

For racial and ethnic makeup, Parkside Jr High School records that 57% of the student body identifies as White. The remainder consists of 18% Black, 13% Hispanic, 9% multiracial, 2% Asian. By comparison, McLean County as a whole is about 78% White, so the school skews visibly less White than its surroundings.

On the resource side, Parkside Jr High School lists 50 full-time-equivalent teachers, putting the student-to-teacher ratio at about 11.9:1. That figure is tighter than the state norm's 13.0:1 average. Around 46% of the student body qualifies for free or reduced-price meals, which schools and policymakers use as a rough income-mix signal.

Adjusting for the school's free-and-reduced-lunch share, Parkside Jr High School performs roughly as the BeatsExpectations model predicts for a school with this FRL share. The predicted value is around 44.9%, the actual is 38.9%, a residual of -6.0 points.

Zooming out to the county, McLean County reports that median household income runs about $79,905, roughly 47% of adults have completed at least a four-year degree, and census figures put the poverty rate at about 7%. In all, McLean County runs 60 public schools (combined enrollment of about 23,759 students), of which Parkside Jr High School is one.

Nearest neighbor: Parkside Elementary School, around 0.1 miles off. Counting just inside five miles, 8 other public schools cluster around Parkside Jr High School. On composite proficiency, Parkside Jr High School comes 3rd of 7 in the immediate cluster, behind the nearby-schools average of 41.3%.

Parkside Jr High School operates from an outer-ring location.

Looking at the recent track record. Over the past 7-year window, the student count fell 15%: 706 students in 2018 compared to 598 in 2025. Over the same period, the White share ticked down from 70% to 57%. The student-to-teacher ratio fell from 15.8:1 in 2018 to 11.9:1 today.

On the community side, recent activity here tends to focus on pickup logistics, teacher feedback, and after-school programs. Members of the school community can share what they know.