Thurgood Marshall Academy Lower School

ELA proficiency of 54.4% is essentially even with the District 5 average of 53.9%, but math at 39.7% sits more than ten points below the district's 50.7%. The trend lines show real volatility — ELA bounced between the mid-30s and mid-50s over the past decade, while math peaked at 52.1% in 2019 before settling into the 30s and low 40s. Upper-grade ELA is the bright spot, with grades 4 and 5 both above 60%, but math dips to 33.3% in fifth grade. The overall quality score of 1.88 out of 4 lands below the district's 2.09, confirming that the school's academic picture is mixed, with math the clear priority.

Families clearly love this school: 97% parent satisfaction, 96% trust in teachers, and 98% trust in the principal all outpace district averages, and 72 families weighed in on the survey. Teachers rate instruction quality at 90% and feel reasonably safe at 87%. The staff-side picture has a notable gap, though — only 62% of teachers trust the principal, and teacher collegial trust sits at 71%. Discipline is calm, with just one suspension in the most recent year and a 1% rate well below the district's 1.2%. Attendance is the harder story: at 85.9% it runs below the district average, and 39.7% of students are chronically absent, with female students (43.9%) and Hispanic students (42.4%) the most affected groups. One caveat: only nine teachers responded to the survey, which makes staff-side numbers harder to read with confidence.

The student body is 77% Black and 19% Hispanic, with very small numbers of White, Asian, and multiracial students, giving the school a diversity index of 37% — well below the citywide norm. That composition mirrors the surrounding Harlem neighborhood, where 25.5% of households live below the poverty line and the median household income is around $54,704. The school's economic need index of 88.3% confirms that nearly all students come from low-income households, and 23% have IEPs. This is a school deeply rooted in one community rather than one that draws from across the city.

The school sits in Harlem, a renter-majority neighborhood where the median household income is about $54,704 and roughly a quarter of households live below the poverty line. Just over a third of adults hold a bachelor's degree, and homeownership is very low at 12.6%, even as median home values sit around $713,860 — a reflection of how much the area has appreciated. Only about 10% of neighborhood households include children, so families with school-age kids are a minority among the surrounding blocks.

Three subway options serve the school: the 3 train at Harlem-148 St is about a four-minute walk, the B and D at 155 St is roughly six minutes, and the 3 at 145 St is about eight minutes away.