Enrollment
365
Elementary
DISTRICT 356 · STATE 380
SCHOOL COMMUNITY·TACOMA SCHOOL DISTRICT·NCES 530870001510
Whitman Elementary School
1120 S 39th St, Tacoma, WA 98408 · (253) 571-7272 · Pierce County
GRADES PK–05ELEMENTARY12-CITYTITLE IREGULAR SCHOOL365 STUDENTS
Student : Teacher
16.7:1
22 FTE teachers
DISTRICT 17.2:1 · STATE 17.3:1
Free / Reduced Lunch
71%
260 students
DISTRICT 57% · STATE 51%
Community
0
0 members
Enrollment and student:teacher ratio compared against other elementary schools. Free/Reduced Lunch and demographics compared against all schools.
Enrollment by grade, 2024-25
| Grade | Students | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Pre-K | 39 | 11% |
| Kindergarten | 78 | 21% |
| Grade 1 | 55 | 15% |
| Grade 2 | 50 | 14% |
| Grade 3 | 52 | 14% |
| Grade 4 | 55 | 15% |
| Grade 5 | 36 | 10% |
This year's kindergarten class (78) is 117% larger than its 5th grade class (36).
Student demographics
79%Diversity index
The chance that two students picked at random belong to different racial or ethnic groups.
DISTRICT 78% · STATE 68% · US 70%
Student head counts by race/ethnicity from federal NCES enrollment data. District, state, and US figures are each group's share of all public school students in that area (US excludes territories). Very small groups may be suppressed in the source, so categories do not always sum exactly to total enrollment.
Gender split
Test scores
Smarter Balanced + WCAS 2024-25 . % Met or Exceeded StandardEnglish Language Arts
27.8%
WA avg 58.4% . +1.1pp since 2014
Math
22.6%
WA avg 51.2% . -12.0pp since 2014
What this means: On the Smarter Balanced + WCAS, Washington's statewide test, about 28 of every 100 students at this school read and write at grade level and about 23 of 100 do math at grade level. Across all Washington schools, those numbers are about 58 and 51. Reading and writing scores are up about 1 points since 2014, while math scores are down about 12 points.
Smarter Balanced + WCAS results by year
| School year | English Language Arts | Math |
|---|---|---|
| 2024-25 | 27.8% | 22.6% |
| 2023-24 | 31.9% | 35.0% |
| 2022-23 | 36.4% | 29.5% |
| 2021-22 | 35.2% | 28.4% |
| 2018-19 | 49.7% | 35.5% |
| 2017-18 | 38.6% | 35.0% |
| 2016-17 | 38.0% | 36.3% |
| 2015-16 | 32.1% | 31.6% |
| 2014-15 | 26.8% | 34.6% |
% Met or Exceeded Standard, all students and all tested grades.
Source: Smarter Balanced + WCAS. All students, all grades. See all years and grades →
BeatsExpectations
Demographically-adjusted score · methodologyTier
AS EXPECTED
Performing as predicted given the school's student profile
Actual proficiency
31.5%
composite math + reading, all grades
Predicted
32.4%
based on WA schools with similar FRL share
Beats by
-0.9pp
below demographic expectation
What this means: About 32% of students here test proficient in math and reading, compared with the roughly 32% typical for Washington schools with a similar share of low-income students. BeatsExpectations measures results against demographically similar schools rather than by raw scores, and this school falls within the typical range, neither among Washington's top nor bottom 10%.
BeatsExpectations runs a per-state regression of proficiency on free/reduced-lunch share, then scores each school by residual. How this is calculated →
Schools most like Whitman Elementary School
Whitman Elementary School's state test result (31.5% proficient) is higher than 0 of the 5 schools below with a result.
| School | Students | Low-income | Proficient |
|---|---|---|---|
| Whitman Elementary School this school | 365 | 71.2% | 31.5% |
| Edison Elementary School Tacoma | 413 | 70.9% | 37.0% |
| Custer Elementary School Lakewood | 358 | 74.0% | 41.0% |
| Twin Lakes Elementary School FEDERAL WAY | 371 | 72.5% | 47.1% |
| Midland Elementary Tacoma | 399 | 69.4% | 38.9% |
| Christensen Elementary Tacoma | 346 | 74.3% | 32.8% |
Matched among Washington elementary schools on enrollment, the share of students from low-income families (eligible for free or reduced-price lunch), and racial and ethnic makeup. Proficient is the average share of students meeting the state standard across all of the school's state tests in 2023-24 and 2024-25, the same combined score our test-score rankings use. Online schools and schools serving specialized populations are not matched.
Where Whitman Elementary School ranks
Among elementary schools| Measure | This school | In Washington | In Pierce County |
|---|---|---|---|
| State test proficiency ranked highest first | 31.5% | #778 of 936 | #122 of 142 |
| Math proficiency ranked highest first | 22.6% | #1,000 of 1,103 ▼ 252 | #135 of 142 ▼ 31 |
| Reading proficiency ranked highest first | 27.8% | #980 of 1,102 ▼ 75 | #135 of 142 ▼ 11 |
| 3-year test score change ranked biggest drop first | -6.6pp | #101 of 928 | #17 of 141 |
| Enrollment ranked largest first | 365 | #757 of 1,268 | #104 of 155 |
| Students per teacher ranked fewest first | 16.7:1 | #747 of 1,085 | #91 of 145 |
| Diversity index ranked most diverse first | 79.3% | #34 of 1,088 | #15 of 145 |
| Free and reduced lunch ranked highest share first | 71.2% | #241 of 1,169 | #24 of 148 |
| Enrollment change since 2017-18 ranked steepest decline first | -6.2% | #651 of 778 | #75 of 91 |
Ranked against other public elementary schools. Online schools are left out of every list, and test-score lists leave out schools that serve specialized populations. Each rank links to the full list. Arrows under a test-score rank show places moved since the prior test year, among schools tested both years.
4-year change
SY 2020-21 vs SY 2024-25Enrollment
365
+21 (+6%) vs 2020
-16% since 1990-91, when it was 436
Student : Teacher
16.7:1
was 16.4:1
Source: NCES Common Core of Data
Enrollment and staffing by year
| School year | Students | Teachers (FTE) | Students per teacher | Free and reduced lunch |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2024-25 | 365 | 21.9 | 16.7:1 | 71% (260) |
| 2023-24 | 342 | 22.1 | 15.5:1 | 75% (257) |
| 2022-23 | 327 | 23 | 14.2:1 | 69% (224) |
| 2020-21 | 344 | 21 | 16.4:1 | 68% (234) |
| 2017-18 | 389 | 24.9 | 15.6:1 | 75% (293) |
| 2015-16 | 456 | 26 | 17.5:1 | 80% (363) |
| 2010-11 | 370 | 25 | 14.8:1 | 70% (258) |
| 2000-01 | 404 | 22 | 18.4:1 | N/A |
| 1990-91 | 436 | 22 | 19.8:1 | N/A |
Source: NCES Common Core of Data. Rows are the federal collections on file for Whitman Elementary School.
Since 2017-18: students down 6% (389 to 365); teachers down 12% (24.9 to 21.9).
About Whitman Elementary School
Federal records list Whitman Elementary School as an elementary school in Tacoma, Washington. The school's enrollment of 365 students covers pre-K through 5.
Whitman Elementary School reports to Tacoma School District, which has 66 schools and 28,900 students.
The most common group at Whitman Elementary School is Hispanic students, at 27%. Enrollment also includes 25% White, 19% multiracial, 16% Black, and 6% Asian. The school's Hispanic share is 15 points above the 13% share among Pierce County residents. The school's diversity index is 79%, meaning two students picked at random have a 79% chance of belonging to different racial or ethnic groups.
Teacher staffing is 21.9 full-time equivalents, or about 16.7 students per teacher. For comparison, elementary schools in Washington average 17.3:1. Eligibility for subsidized school meals is 71%. The average for public schools in Pierce County is 50%.
Whitman Elementary School is within a point of its predicted average proficiency rate on state tests (31.5% versus 32.4%), which places it in neither the top nor the bottom 10% in Washington.
Within Pierce County, the median household income is $99,564, about 31% of adults have at least a bachelor's degree, and the poverty rate is about 6%. In all, Pierce County has 287 public schools and roughly 138,462 students.
Lincoln High School is the nearest neighboring public school, about 0.4 miles away. The five-mile area around Whitman Elementary School holds at least 8 other public schools. Ranking the closest schools with test data puts Whitman Elementary School at 3rd of 7.
Locale data from NCES put Whitman Elementary School inside a principal city with a population between 100,000 and 250,000 (City: Mid-size).
Compared with 2020-21, the school had 21 more students in 2024-25.
Topics for discussion here include school events, clubs, and volunteer needs. Alumni can share how the school prepared them.
Pierce County at a glance
View full county profilePopulation
930,319
Census ACS
Median income
$99,564
Household, ACS
Bachelor's+
31%
Adults 25+
Poverty rate
6%
Below federal line
Schools in county
287
138,462 students
Quick facts
Related schools
Other schools in Tacoma School District
- Stadium High SchoolHigh · 1,700 students
- Lincoln High SchoolHigh · 1,556 students
- Mount Tahoma High SchoolHigh · 1,410 students
- Dr. Dolores Silas High SchoolHigh · 1,160 students
- Baker Middle SchoolMiddle · 687 students
- Tacoma School of the ArtsHigh · 658 students
Other schools in Tacoma
- Stadium High SchoolHigh · 1,700 students
- Lincoln High SchoolHigh · 1,556 students
- Mount Tahoma High SchoolHigh · 1,410 students
- Dr. Dolores Silas High SchoolHigh · 1,160 students
- Washington High SchoolHigh · 989 students
- Franklin Pierce High SchoolHigh · 977 students
Other Whitman Elementary schools
9 other US public schools in 9 states are named Whitman Elementary. Whitman Elementary School is the 4th largest of the 10.
- Whitman ElementarySpokane, WA · 362 students
- Whitman Elementary SchoolPONTIAC, MI · 611 students
- Whitman Elementary SchoolMESA, AZ · 569 students
- Whitman Elementary SchoolTURNERSVILLE, NJ · 566 students
- Whitman ElementaryMilwaukee, WI · 339 students
Nearby schools
- Lincoln High School0.4 mi · 1,556
- Reed Elementary School0.6 mi · 426
- Mann Elementary School0.8 mi · 340
- Angelo Giaudrone Middle School0.8 mi · 449
- Willard Early Learning Center0.9 mi · 30
- Lyon Elementary School0.9 mi · 381
Frequently asked questions
About Whitman Elementary SchoolWhat is the total enrollment at Whitman Elementary School?
Whitman Elementary School enrolls approximately 365 students in grades PK-05.
What age range does Whitman Elementary School serve?
Whitman Elementary School serves students from grade PK through grade 05.
How many students per teacher at Whitman Elementary School?
Approximately 16.7:1 students per teacher at Whitman Elementary School.
How diverse is Whitman Elementary School?
Whitman Elementary School reports a student body of 25% White, 27% Hispanic, 16% Black, 6% Asian, 19% Two or more.
Who oversees Whitman Elementary School?
Whitman Elementary School is overseen by Tacoma School District in Pierce County.
Data sourceSchool profile facts are sourced from the NCES. Community content is posted by allk12 members.