Ward L Elem School

Ward L Elem School is an elementary school of tight-knit scale in Chicago, Illinois, run under Chicago Public Schools Dist 299, serveing 279 students in grades pre-K through 8. Enrollment runs roughly 27% leaner than the state mean of about 381.

Within Chicago Public Schools Dist 299, which oversees 622 schools and 324,396 students, Ward L Elem School is one campus in the system.

Demographically, Ward L Elem School shows that 66% of the student body identifies as Black. Beyond that, the school reports 33% Hispanic. By comparison, Cook County as a whole is about 22% Black, so the school skews visibly more Black than its surroundings.

Looking at school resources, The school reports having 25 full-time-equivalent teachers, for a student-teacher ratio near 11.2:1. The state averages around 13.9:1, so this campus is tighter than the state norm typical. Around 92% of the student body qualifies for free or reduced-price meals, often used as a Title I proxy. By comparison, Cook County runs at roughly 66%, so the school's eligibility rate is higher than the surrounding baseline.

After controlling for student poverty, Ward L Elem School performs roughly as the BeatsExpectations model predicts for a school with this FRL share. The predicted value is around 18.5%, the actual is 9.0%, a residual of -9.6 points.

Zooming out to the county, community-level numbers for Cook County indicate 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. Ward L Elem School is one of 1406 public schools in Cook County (combined enrollment of about 697,934 students).

Nearest neighbor: Noble St Chtr-Rowe-Clark MS Acad, around 0.1 miles off. Counting just inside five miles, 8 other public schools cluster around Ward L Elem School. Ranking that nearby cluster on reported proficiency puts Ward L Elem School at 7th of 9; the average score across the group is 16.5%.

The school occupies a downtown site.

Trend over the last 7 years. Over the past 7-year window, the student count declined 40%: 467 students in 2018 compared to 279 in 2025. The Black share of enrollment contracted from 93% to 66% over that span. The student-to-teacher ratio pulled in from 17.5:1 in 2018 to 11.2:1 today.

On the community side, members of the Ward L Elem School community share and discuss open house dates, ride-share offers, and field-trip permission slips. Posting is open to anyone connected to the school.