UNDERWOOD ELEM.

As an expansive elementary school in LEE'S SUMMIT, Missouri, UNDERWOOD ELEM. hosts 511 students from grades K through 5, part of LEE'S SUMMIT R-VII. By comparison, Missouri's public schools average about 315 students each, so UNDERWOOD ELEM. sits 62% larger than that benchmark.

LEE'S SUMMIT R-VII comprises 28 schools with combined enrollment of 17,695 students; UNDERWOOD ELEM. is among them.

Looking at the student body, UNDERWOOD ELEM. lists that the largest single group is White, at 56% of enrollment; the rest breaks down as 24% Black, 10% multiracial, 8% Hispanic.

In terms of school funding signals, On paper, UNDERWOOD ELEM. has 35 full-time-equivalent teachers, translating to a class-load average of around 14.7:1. That figure is higher than the state norm's 12.4:1 average. Roughly 40% of students at UNDERWOOD ELEM. qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, a commonly cited indicator of low-income enrollment. Set against Jackson County (around 60%), the school's rate is south of typical.

On a demographically-adjusted basis, On a poverty-adjusted basis, UNDERWOOD ELEM. sits in the bottom 10% statewide. Predicted proficiency from the FRL regression is roughly 50.5%; actual is 21.8%, a gap of -28.7 points.

Across the wider county, ACS estimates for Jackson County put the typical household earns roughly $68,577 per year, about 34% of the adult population holds a bachelor's degree or above, and roughly 10% of residents live below the federal poverty line. UNDERWOOD ELEM. is one of 244 public schools in Jackson County (combined enrollment of about 105,714 students).

The closest other public school is BERNARD C. CAMPBELL MIDDLE, roughly 0.1 miles away. Counting just inside five miles, 8 other public schools cluster around UNDERWOOD ELEM.. On composite proficiency, UNDERWOOD ELEM. comes 6th of 7 in the immediate cluster, behind the nearby-schools average of 46.9%.

The campus sits in a bedroom-community setting.

Over the past 7-year window. UNDERWOOD ELEM.'s enrollment has grew 11% since 2018, when it stood at 461 (now 511). Over the same period, the White share ticked down from 78% to 56%. Class-load math has tightened: from 16.1:1 in 2018 to 14.7:1 in 2025.

On the community side, posts here usually surface around classroom updates, athletics, and weather closures. Members of the school community can share what they know.