The statewide picture for 2025-26 is flat: the typical Washington school's combined math and English language arts proficiency moved a tenth of a point. Underneath that, 352 schools moved by 10 or more combined points in a single year, 194 up and 158 down. These are the largest moves among the 1,730 schools with at least 200 students and a complete record in both years.
The biggest gains
| Friday Harbor High School (San Juan Island SD) | +38.2 pp | |
| South Whidbey High School | +31.3 pp | |
| Ida Nason Aronica Elementary (Ellensburg) | +28.4 pp | |
| Silver Star Elementary (Evergreen SD, Vancouver) | +25.9 pp | |
| Sultan Senior High School | +25.9 pp | |
| Olympia Regional Learning Academy | +25.4 pp | |
| Rochester High School | +24.5 pp | |
| McKinley Elementary (Yakima) | +24.5 pp | |
| Sunset Primary (University Place) | +24.5 pp | |
| Rainier Beach High School (Seattle) | +23.5 pp | |
| Roosevelt Elementary (Granger) | +23.3 pp | |
| Toutle Lake Elementary | +23.0 pp |
WA K12 Academic Atlas history.json. Combined change is the math percentage-point change plus the ELA percentage-point change.
Friday Harbor High School, 248 students on San Juan Island, went from 28% to 53% in math and from 61% to 74% in ELA. South Whidbey High, across the water, went from 36% to 54% in math and 63% to 76% in ELA. Six of the twelve biggest gainers are high schools, which test only one grade and so swing more than elementary schools. Five of the twelve are majority low-income: McKinley Elementary in Yakima (83% low-income) nearly doubled its math rate from 14% to 31%, Roosevelt Elementary in Granger (81%) went from 24% to 43%, and Rainier Beach High in Seattle (72%) went from 15% to 29% in math and 33% to 42% in ELA.
The biggest declines
| Downing Elementary (Tacoma) | -36.4 pp | |
| Naches Valley High School | -34.9 pp | |
| Pinewood Elementary (Marysville) | -31.9 pp | |
| Edison Elementary (Burlington-Edison) | -29.2 pp | |
| Tenino High School | -28.2 pp | |
| Industrial Design Engineering and Arts (Tacoma) | -26.8 pp | |
| Medical Lake High School | -26.6 pp | |
| Okanogan High School | -24.9 pp | |
| Red Rock Elementary (Royal SD) | -24.7 pp | |
| Sultan Middle School | -24.0 pp | |
| Valley Academy of Learning (Wenatchee) | -23.6 pp | |
| Goldendale High School | -23.3 pp |
WA K12 Academic Atlas history.json.
Downing Elementary in Tacoma fell from 54% to 36% in math and from 62% to 43% in ELA. Naches Valley High School, east of Yakima, fell from 40% to 23% in math and from 70% to 52% in ELA. Pinewood Elementary in Marysville lost 19 points in math and 13 in ELA in the year its district closed a middle school and reorganized every elementary into a K-6. Sultan appears on both lists: its high school gained 26 combined points while its middle school lost 24. Eight of the twelve biggest decliners are high schools or K-12 option programs, the same small-cohort volatility that produced most of the biggest gains.
Most schools barely moved
WA K12 Academic Atlas history.json; 1,011 elementary, 325 middle, and 351 high schools with 200+ students.
Only 28 schools gained 20 or more combined points and 24 lost as many. The median elementary school moved 0.0 points, the median middle school −0.1, the median high school +0.5. A one-year change of 10 points at a 300-student elementary school is roughly 15 students crossing the proficiency line, and the lists above include a few schools that simply had an unusual cohort. The schools that appear on both this list and the multi-year most-improved list, such as Olympia Regional Learning Academy, are the ones whose gains look like a trend rather than a year.