John Fiske Elem

Located at 625 S Valley, in Kansas City, Kansas, John Fiske Elem is a medium-sized elementary campus that works with 287 students (grades K through 5), run under Kansas City.

Across the 43 schools in Kansas City (21,538 students total), John Fiske Elem accounts for its share of the district's footprint.

For racial and ethnic makeup, John Fiske Elem reports that the student body is overwhelmingly Hispanic (85%). Other groups include 9% White, 5% Black. By comparison, Wyandotte County as a whole is about 34% Hispanic, so the school skews visibly more Hispanic than its surroundings.

On the income-and-resources front, The school reports having 20 full-time-equivalent teachers, for a student-teacher ratio near 14.1:1. That figure is higher than the state norm's 13.2:1 average. Around 95% of the student body qualifies for free or reduced-price meals, which schools and policymakers use as a rough income-mix signal. By comparison, Wyandotte County runs at roughly 75%, so the school's eligibility rate is above the surrounding baseline.

Adjusting for the school's free-and-reduced-lunch share, John Fiske Elem tracks the demographic baseline. The model predicts 16.6% given the school's FRL share; actual proficiency is 13.9%.

Zooming out to the county, the surrounding county (Wyandotte County) shows that the typical household earns roughly $63,631 per year, 21% of adults hold a bachelor's degree or higher, and the poverty rate sits near 12%. In all, Wyandotte County runs 62 public schools (combined enrollment of about 30,713 students), of which John Fiske Elem is one.

Whittier Elem is the nearest neighboring public school, about 0.8 miles from this campus. 8 of the 8 nearest public schools sit inside a five-mile radius. On composite proficiency, John Fiske Elem comes 6th of 9 in the immediate cluster, beneath the nearby-schools average of 16.4%.

The school occupies an urban site.

Looking at the recent track record. Looking back 7 years, enrollment at John Fiske Elem has decreased 72%, going from 1,033 students in 2018 to 287 in 2025. Over the same period, the Hispanic share climbed from 62% to 85%. The student-to-teacher ratio fell from 40.8:1 in 2018 to 14.1:1 today.

On this page, the page collects discussion, questions, and updates around classroom updates, athletics, and weather closures. Members of the school community can share what they know.