Best Public Elementary Schools in Tacoma / Pierce County
Pierce County's top public elementaries cluster in three distinct geographies: the Gig Harbor peninsula (Peninsula School District), the east-Tacoma / University Place / Browns Point waterfront, and the Sumner / Bonney Lake corridor on the county's eastern edge. Tacoma Public Schools, the county's largest district, is represented by only one school in the top ten — Browns Point Elementary, on the Tacoma waterfront across Commencement Bay from downtown.
Purdy Elementary in the Peninsula School District leads the list. Peninsula SD, headquartered in Gig Harbor, serves the Key Peninsula and Gig Harbor peninsula communities and was selected for the State Superintendent's Award for Educational Excellence in Student Achievement, an honor given to only 25 of Washington's 295 districts. Five of the top ten elementaries on this list are in Peninsula SD — Purdy, Harbor Heights, Artondale, Pioneer, and Discovery — all in or near Gig Harbor. The geographic concentration reflects both the district's strong overall performance and the demographic stability of the Gig Harbor peninsula relative to the Tacoma waterfront and South Sound suburbs.
Browns Point Elementary in Tacoma Public Schools is a notable outlier in the data. Browns Point posts 68 percent math and 75 percent ELA proficiency, dramatically higher than Tacoma's district averages of roughly 32 percent math and 46 percent ELA. The school ranks first among Tacoma SD's 34 ranked elementaries and serves the Browns Point and Dash Point neighborhoods, geographically separate from the rest of Tacoma and demographically more aligned with Federal Way. Maple Lawn in Sumner-Bonney Lake SD and the two University Place schools (University Place Primary and Chambers) round out the non-Peninsula representation.
A pattern worth flagging: Pierce County's elementary leaders cluster around the Narrows Bridge corridor connecting Gig Harbor to Tacoma's west side, and along the Federal Way-adjacent Browns Point / Dash Point waterfront. Elementaries in central, south, and east Tacoma — and in the Puyallup, Bethel, and Franklin Pierce districts — do not appear in this top ten despite serving substantially more students.
Most of Pierce County's top elementaries cluster in University Place, the Gig Harbor Peninsula, and Tacoma's north end (Stadium District, Old Town), with Sumner-Bonney Lake's east-side schools contributing additional top-ten entries. The Bethel, Franklin Pierce, and Clover Park districts — which serve much of south Tacoma and unincorporated south Pierce — do not place a school in the top ten on SBA proficiency.
Ranked schools
- 001PURDY ELEMENTARY SCHOOLPENINSULA SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE76%
- 002MAPLE LAWN ELEMENTARYSUMNER-BONNEY LAKE SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE76%
- 003HARBOR HEIGHTS ELEMENTARY SCHOOLPENINSULA SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE73%
- 004BROWNS POINT ELEMENTARY SCHOOLTACOMA SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE72%
- 005UNIVERSITY PLACE PRIMARYUNIVERSITY PLACE SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE71%
- 006ARTONDALE ELEMENTARY SCHOOLPENINSULA SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE71%
- 007CHAMBERS ELEMENTARYUNIVERSITY PLACE SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE71%
- 008PIONEER ELEMENTARY SCHOOLPENINSULA SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE70%
- 009DISCOVERY ELEMENTARY SCHOOLPENINSULA SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE70%
- 010BEACHWOOD ELEMENTARY SCHOOLCLOVER PARK SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE70%
- 011SWIFT WATER ELEMENTARYPENINSULA SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE69%
- 012VOYAGER ELEMENTARYPENINSULA SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE69%
- 013CRESTWOOD ELEMENTARYSUMNER-BONNEY LAKE SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE68%
- 014SHERMAN ELEMENTARY SCHOOLTACOMA SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE66%
- 015LOWELL ELEMENTARY SCHOOLTACOMA SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE66%
- 016WASHINGTON ELEMENTARY SCHOOLTACOMA SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE65%
- 017JEFFERSON ELEMENTARY SCHOOLTACOMA SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE65%
- 018NELSON ELEMENTARY SCHOOLBETHEL SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE63%
- 019LAKELAND HILLS ELEMENTARYAUBURN SCHOOL DISTRICT · KING62%
- 020DAFFODIL VALLEY ELEMENTARYSUMNER-BONNEY LAKE SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE62%
- 021POINT DEFIANCE ELEMENTARY SCHOOLTACOMA SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE61%
- 022EVERGREEN PRIMARYUNIVERSITY PLACE SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE61%
- 023SHAW ROAD ELEMENTARYPUYALLUP SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE61%
- 024CHLOE CLARK ELEMENTARYSTEILACOOM HIST. SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE60%
- 025SUNSET PRIMARYUNIVERSITY PLACE SCHOOL DISTRICT · PIERCE60%
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