Cottonwood Elementary

Cottonwood Elementary operates as a medium-sized K-5 school in Andover, Kansas, overseen by Andover. Current enrollment sits at 388 students spanning grades K through 5. That puts it 24% bigger than the typical public school in Kansas, which averages around 313 students.

Cottonwood Elementary is one of 11 schools operated by Andover, a district that serves 9,460 students overall.

On the student-mix side, Cottonwood Elementary shows that the largest single group is White, at 76% of enrollment. Beyond that, the school records 10% multiracial, 8% Hispanic, 3% Asian, 2% Black. That is meaningfully less White than the county at large, where the share is closer to 87%.

On the income-and-resources front, Staff filings list 28 full-time-equivalent teachers, which works out to roughly 13.8:1 students per teacher. The state averages about 13.2:1, putting this campus right in line with peers. Around 33% of the student body qualifies for free or reduced-price meals, which schools and policymakers use as a rough income-mix signal.

With demographic context factored in, Cottonwood Elementary tracks the demographic baseline. The model predicts 46.3% given the school's FRL share; actual proficiency is 59.0%.

In the surrounding community, the surrounding county (Butler County) logs that the typical household earns roughly $81,610 per year, about 32% of the adult population holds a bachelor's degree or above, and census figures put the poverty rate at about 6%. Cottonwood Elementary is one of 42 public schools in Butler County (combined enrollment of about 18,052 students).

Andover High is the nearest neighboring public school, about 0.2 miles from this campus. Counting just inside five miles, 8 other public schools cluster around Cottonwood Elementary. Ranking that nearby cluster on reported proficiency puts Cottonwood Elementary at 4th of 8; the average score across the group is 56.5%.

Geographically, the school is in a residential area.

Five-year trend. Cottonwood Elementary's enrollment has changed only slightly since 2018, when it stood at 391 (now 388). Over the same period, the White share declined from 81% to 76%. Class-load math has tightened: from 17.4:1 in 2018 to 13.8:1 in 2025.

On the community side, recent activity here tends to focus on fundraisers, lost-and-found posts, and report-card season. Anyone with firsthand experience at this school can post or comment.