Johnston Elementary

Johnston Elementary is one of the mid-tier elementary-level communitys in Appleton, Wisconsin, run under Appleton Area School District, with 286 students on its rolls from grades pre-K through 5.

Within Appleton Area School District, which oversees 38 schools and 14,994 students, Johnston Elementary is one campus in the system.

On the student-mix side, Johnston Elementary logs that the largest single group is White at 47%, but no single group is in the majority. The remainder looks like 24% Asian, 11% multiracial, 10% Hispanic, 8% Black. By comparison, Outagamie County as a whole is about 86% White, so the school skews noticeably less White than its surroundings.

Looking at school resources, Staff filings list 26 full-time-equivalent teachers, which works out to roughly 11.0:1 students per teacher. That figure is tighter than the state norm's 14.7:1 average. Roughly 58% of students at Johnston Elementary qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, often used as a Title I proxy. Set against Outagamie County (around 32%), the school's rate is meaningfully above typical.

Adjusting for the school's free-and-reduced-lunch share, Johnston Elementary performs roughly as the BeatsExpectations model predicts for a school with this FRL share. The predicted value is around 42.3%, the actual is 46.6%, a residual of +4.4 points.

Around the school, census data for Outagamie County shows median household income runs about $85,069, 33% of adults hold a bachelor's degree or higher, and the poverty rate sits near 4%. Johnston Elementary is one of 73 public schools in Outagamie County (combined enrollment of about 31,330 students).

Nearest neighbor: Tesla Engineering Charter School, around 0.6 miles off. Within five miles, there are 8 other public schools. Among the 8 schools in that immediate cluster with test data (this one included), Johnston Elementary ranks 6th on composite proficiency, below the local average of 52.6%.

Geographically, the school is in an urban area.

Five-year trend. Looking back 7 years, enrollment at Johnston Elementary has declined 36%, going from 450 students in 2018 to 286 in 2025. White enrollment moved from 58% to 47% across the same window. The student-to-teacher ratio fell from 13.3:1 in 2018 to 11.0:1 today.

On allk12, the page collects discussion, questions, and updates around fundraisers, lost-and-found posts, and report-card season. Contributors range from current parents to recent graduates and teachers.