Prairie Elem

Prairie Elem, an average-sized elementary-level community in Prairie Village, Kansas, overseen by Shawnee Mission Pub Sch, enrolls 446 students, covering grades pre-K through 6. By comparison, Kansas's public schools average about 313 students each, so Prairie Elem sits 42% bigger than that benchmark.

Prairie Elem is one of 45 schools operated by Shawnee Mission Pub Sch, a district that enrolls 26,330 students overall.

On demographics, Prairie Elem records that nearly all students (87%) are White. Beyond that, the school records 5% Hispanic, 5% multiracial. The wider county runs roughly 79% White, putting the school's mix visibly more White than the area baseline.

Looking at school resources, Prairie Elem shows 27 full-time-equivalent teachers, putting the student-to-teacher ratio at about 16.6:1. Statewide, the average ratio sits near 13.2:1, putting Prairie Elem higher than the state norm the norm. Roughly 6% of students at Prairie Elem qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, often used as a Title I proxy. By comparison, Johnson County runs at roughly 27%, so the school's eligibility rate is below the surrounding baseline.

On a demographically-adjusted basis, Prairie Elem ranks in the top 10% of Kansas public schools. The BeatsExpectations model, a per-state regression of composite proficiency on FRL share, predicts schools with this student profile to land around 59.4%; Prairie Elem posts 76.2%, +16.8 points above that line.

In the area at large, community-level numbers for Johnson County indicate median household income runs about $109,208, roughly 58% of adults have completed at least a four-year degree, and census figures put the poverty rate at about 3%. Across Johnson County's 168 public schools (combined enrollment of about 93,598 students), Prairie Elem is one campus in the mix.

Nearest neighbor: Indian Hills Middle, around 0.4 miles off. Within five miles, there are 8 other public schools. On composite proficiency, Prairie Elem comes 3rd of 8 in the immediate cluster, above the nearby-schools average of 64.5%.

Prairie Elem operates from a suburban location.

Over the past 7-year window. Over the past 7-year window, the student count stayed largely flat: 451 students in 2018 compared to 446 in 2025. White enrollment moved from 92% to 87% across the same window.

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