William McKinley Elementary School

Set in East Chicago, Indiana, William McKinley Elementary School is a mid-sized elementary-level community, operated by School City of East Chicago. It serves 509 students across grades K through 6.

William McKinley Elementary School is one of 7 schools operated by School City of East Chicago, a district that instructs 3,225 students overall.

On demographics, William McKinley Elementary School records that 56% of the student body identifies as Hispanic. Beyond that, the school logs 37% Black, 3% multiracial, 3% White. That is visibly more Hispanic than the county at large, where the share is closer to 21%.

In terms of school funding signals, On paper, William McKinley Elementary School has 31 full-time-equivalent teachers, translating to a class-load average of around 16.7:1. That figure is higher than the state norm's 15.5:1 average. Roughly 70% of students at William McKinley Elementary School qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, a number frequently used as a low-income enrollment indicator. That share is north of Lake County's rate of about 47%.

Adjusting for the school's free-and-reduced-lunch share, William McKinley Elementary School tracks the demographic baseline. The model predicts 25.8% given the school's FRL share; actual proficiency is 13.3%.

Across the wider county, community-level numbers for Lake County indicate median household earnings sit near $71,493, roughly 26% of adults have completed at least a four-year degree, and the poverty rate sits near 11%. Across Lake County's 121 public schools (combined enrollment of about 74,661 students), William McKinley Elementary School is one campus in the mix.

Nearest neighbor: Benjamin Harrison Elementary Sch, around 0.5 miles off. 8 of the 8 nearest public schools sit inside a five-mile radius. Among the 6 schools in that immediate cluster with test data (this one included), William McKinley Elementary School ranks 4th on composite proficiency, below the local average of 16.4%.

The campus sits in a residential setting.

Five-year trend. Over the past 7-year window, the student count contracted 20%: 633 students in 2018 compared to 509 in 2025. Over the same period, the Hispanic share decreased from 67% to 56%. The student-to-teacher ratio tightened from 20.4:1 in 2018 to 16.7:1 today.

Within the allk12 community for this school, posts here usually surface around sports schedules, lunch menu changes, and school spirit week. Contributors range from current parents to recent graduates and teachers.