Washington Connections Academy Goldendale
Lacy, WA · Grades K–12
Olympia-Lacey-Tumwater, WA
NeighborhoodDecoded Rank
All factors combined
Bottom 15% decoded
#50 of 57
Olympia-Lacey-Tumwater, WA schools
Lower Performance
#1373 in WA
Achievement Rank
Raw test performance
Bottom 15% achievement
#54 of 57
Olympia-Lacey-Tumwater, WA schools
#1135 in WA
Lower by Both Measures
This school ranks low on both raw achievement and decoded performance.
Data confidence:Medium1364 students tested 3 years89% participation
Confidence is computed from sample size, year coverage, and participation rate. Higher confidence means the rank shift is stable across years and not driven by a single small cohort.
- Tested students: total students with valid scores across all reported years.
- Years of data: number of school years included. More years smooths year-to-year noise.
- Participation: share of enrolled students who took the assessment. Low participation can bias scores.
What's driving this rank
Decoded Rank: #50 of 57
in Olympia-Lacey-Tumwater, WA schools
Each component below is scored on a 0–100 within-metro scale. A qualitative band summarizes where the school lands.
- LowPerforms above what its context predictsCounts for 35% of the rank
After accounting for income and demographics, does this school beat what the data would predict?
- Below averageStudents gain ground year over yearCounts for 30% of the rank
Are kids at this school learning faster than typical for the metro?
- StrongEquity within the schoolCounts for 15% of the rank
Are students clustered at similar levels, or split between top and bottom?
- Thin dataDirection over recent yearsCounts for 10% of the rank
Is this school's Decoded Rank trending up or down across the years we have data for?
- StrongMost students were testedCounts for 10% of the rank
Was the rank computed against a representative share of the school's students?
Show the numbersFor the methodology-curious
Each component is converted to a 0–100 within-metro percentile (100 = top of the metro). "Contribution" is the percentile-points the component adds to (or subtracts from) the metro median before the schools are re-ranked into the composite.
| Component | Weight | Percentile | Contribution |
|---|---|---|---|
| Performs above what its context predicts | 35% | 2 | -16.9 |
| Students gain ground year over year | 30% | 26 | -7.1 |
| Equity within the school | 15% | 100 | +7.5 |
| Direction over recent years · thin data | 10% | 50 | +0.0 |
| Most students were tested | 10% | 89 | +3.9 |
Why trust this?- Public data sources
- Context-adjusted model
- Confidence shown
- Methodology published
This score uses state assessment data, NCES enrollment data, and Census ACS 5-year neighborhood data. The Decoded Rank adjusts for school context — student demographics, ELL/SPED service rates, and the socioeconomic profile of the surrounding tract — and shows how the school performs relative to expectation, not in absolute terms.
SchoolDecoder is one signal, not a verdict. Decoded Rank is a context-adjusted residual, not a causal claim about teaching quality. See full methodology →
All Rankings
How this school ranks across the metro, state, and among demographic peers.
| Scope | Achievement | Decoded | Shift |
|---|---|---|---|
| Olympia-Lacey-Tumwater, WA (57 schools) | #54 | #50 | |
| WA (1506 schools) | #1135 | #1373 | |
| Among similar schools (6 peers) | #1 | #1 |
Resource context
School inputs, not ranking points
These fields describe the school and surrounding neighborhood. They help readers interpret the page, but this is not a dollar-by-dollar or ratio-by-ratio scorecard and the fields here are not components of the Decoded Rank.
- Enrollment
- 2,121
- Free/reduced-price lunch
- 41.9%
- Student-teacher ratio
- 29.1:1
- Locale
- City, small
- School type
- Regular public school
- Enrollment model
- Neighborhood attendance area
- Neighborhood median income
- $95,703ACS tract proxy
- Neighborhood poverty
- 0.1%ACS tract proxy
- SES index
- 60.4
- Assessment data year
- 2025
- CCD year
- 2024
- ACS vintage
- 2020-2024
High School Outcomes
Latest available dataGraduation 2025 · Coursework 2021 · AP exams 2015 · SAT/ACT 2021
- Graduation
- 75%
- 2025 cohort · 75% extended
- AP coursework
- 42
- Advanced options
- AP
- 35 students in advanced math · CRDC 2021
- SAT/ACT tested
- 8
- CRDC 2021
Data limitations
- Graduation uses state cohort data. Coursework, offerings, and SAT/ACT counts use the latest available federal CRDC extracts, which can lag current graduation data.
- SAT/ACT data is count-only in this extract; without an enrollment denominator, we do not treat it as a participation rate.
- HS Decoded Rank is alpha-only: it summarizes how the school's grade 10/11 test scores compare to expectations from its demographic context, ranked against other HSs in the same metro / state / rural cohort. Graduation, AP, and SAT/ACT data above are descriptive context — they are not yet blended into the composite rank.
Within Goldendale School District: #1 of 1. View district
Performance Spread
How students are distributed across the four state-assessment proficiency levels — L1: below standard, L2: approaching, L3: meets (proficient), L4: exceeds. This describes the shape of results at the school, not their height.
Students at this school cluster closely on the proficiency ladder.
- Level 1 — Below standard38%
- Level 2 — Approaching standard27%
- Level 3 — Meets standard (proficient)24%
- Level 4 — Exceeds standard12%
Performance Spread measures how evenly students are distributed across the L1..L4 proficiency ladder, treating the levels as an ordered scale (L1=1, L2=2, L3=3, L4=4) and weighting each by its student share. A school where most students cluster at one level has a TIGHT spread; a school split between the bottom and top has a WIDE or BIMODAL spread. Bimodal fires only when BOTH tails are non-trivial AND the middle is relatively hollow (pct_L1 ≥ 15, pct_L4 ≥ 25, pct_L2 + pct_L3 ≤ 60). It describes shape — NOT how high the school's scores are. Methodology
Nearby Schools
Sorted by distance. Both rank columns shown so you can compare quickly.
- Horizons Elementary1.0 mi
- Aspire Middle School1.1 mi
- Komachin Middle School1.1 mi
- Chambers Prairie Elementary School1.2 mi
- Lakes Elementary School1.3 mi
| School | Achievement | Decoded | Shift | Story | Confidence |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Horizons Elementary | #18 | #31 | Typical Profile | High | |
| Aspire Middle School | #1 | #1 | ★Strong by Both Measures | High | |
| Komachin Middle School | #40 | #8 | ★★Outperforming Expectations | High | |
| Chambers Prairie Elementary School | #46 | #44 | Lower by Both Measures | High | |
| Lakes Elementary School | #17 | #35 | Typical Profile | High |
Similar Schools
Schools with comparable demographics, income, and size. Both rank columns shown for direct comparison.
| School | Achievement | Decoded | Shift | Story | Confidence |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kentridge High School | Rankings coming soon. | ||||
| Puyallup High School | Rankings coming soon. | ||||
| Yelm High School 12 | Rankings coming soon. | ||||
| Garfield High School | Rankings coming soon. | ||||
| South Kitsap High School | Rankings coming soon. | ||||
Historical Ranks
Year-by-year decoded and achievement ranks. Pandemic-affected years are excluded — we don't interpolate scores across the gap.
| Year | Achievement | Decoded | Shift |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | #54 | #50 | |
| 2024 | Excluded | ||
| 2023 | Excluded | ||
Note: assessment transitions (where a state changes its test) are footnoted on the methodology page; trends are not computed across breakpoints.
Trajectory
Not enough years yet
Trajectory will appear with 2025-26 data once we have two or more years of rankings for this school.
How this works: we fit a linear trend across the available years of Decoded percentile, then bucket the slope into a direction. Wide confidence intervals (uncertain trends) collapse to Holding steady. See the methodology page for thresholds.
Cohort Progression
Kids who started 3rd grade here in 2023 lost 7 proficiency points by 5th grade.
Based on 14 cohorts across math + ELA.
Learning rate: -0.8 proficiency points/yr (95% CI -4.9 to 3.2)
| Cohort | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 | Slope |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ELA · started 10th in 2023 | G10 266 | — | ||
| ELA · started 10th in 2024 | G10 277 | — | ||
| ELA · started 8th in 2023 | G8 227 | G10 268 | +20.4 | |
| ELA · started 7th in 2023 | G7 232 | G8 231 | -1.1 | |
| ELA · started 6th in 2023 | G6 225 | G7 231 | G8 225 | -0.2 |
| ELA · started 5th in 2023 | G5 218 | G6 212 | G7 219 | +0.9 |
| ELA · started 4th in 2023 | G4 214 | G5 218 | G6 217 | +1.5 |
| ELA · started 3rd in 2023 | G3 205 | G4 210 | G5 198 | -3.7 |
| ELA · started 3rd in 2024 | G3 197 | G4 204 | +6.6 | |
| ELA · started 3rd in 2025 | G3 184 | — | ||
| Math · started 10th in 2023 | G10 168 | — | ||
| Math · started 10th in 2024 | G10 169 | — | ||
| Math · started 8th in 2023 | G8 161 | G10 166 | +2.4 | |
| Math · started 7th in 2023 | G7 195 | G8 179 | -16.4 | |
| Math · started 6th in 2023 | G6 202 | G7 197 | G8 176 | -13.3 |
| Math · started 5th in 2023 | G5 180 | G6 187 | G7 182 | +0.6 |
| Math · started 4th in 2023 | G4 195 | G5 186 | G6 186 | -4.9 |
| Math · started 3rd in 2023 | G3 192 | G4 196 | G5 163 | -14.4 |
| Math · started 3rd in 2024 | G3 197 | G4 189 | -8.0 | |
| Math · started 3rd in 2025 | G3 171 | — | ||
| Science · started 11th in 2023 | G11 229 | — | ||
| Science · started 11th in 2024 | G11 240 | — | ||
| Science · started 11th in 2025 | G11 249 | — |
How this works: we follow each grade-cohort across years through the school (3rd graders in 2023 are 4th graders in 2024, etc.) and fit a linear slope on a 100–400 proficiency-points scale built from the state assessment's four levels (L1=1, L2=2, L3=3, L4=4, weighted by student share). This is the same construction Stanford SEDA uses (edopportunity.org/methods); it's not student-level tracking — we measure the school's cohort, not individuals. See the methodology page for thresholds.
Evidence & technical detailClick to expand
School Alpha
School Alpha is the residual between actual and expected performance once school context is held constant. It is a context-adjusted estimate, not a causal claim about teaching quality.
- Shrunk Alpha (95% CI)
- -0.94 (95% CI: -0.96 to -0.93)
SES index components
- SES method
- Blended SES index (ACS + FRL)
- SES index value
- 60.4
- FRL %
- 41.9%
- ELL %
- —
- SPED %
- —
- Tract median income (ACS 5-year)
- $95,703
- Tract poverty rate
- 0.1%
- Tract % bachelor's+
- 37.9%
What "Decoded Rank" means
Decoded Rank converts School Alpha — the context-adjusted residual — into a parent-facing rank within the metro pool. A higher Decoded Rank than Achievement Rank means the school's raw scores understate its performance once neighborhood and school context are held constant. The reverse means raw scores overstate it. The rank is one signal, not a verdict.