Franklin Avenue Elementary vs Charles H. Kim Elementary

Franklin Avenue Elementary ranks #360 of 9,533 California schools while Charles H. Kim Elementary ranks #9 of 9,533 — a gap that situates both schools in the top tier statewide, though Charles H. Kim sits in a different category entirely. The overall rating gap is 0.8 points, with Charles H. Kim Elementary scoring 9.6/10 against Franklin Avenue Elementary's 8.8/10, and that difference is driven almost entirely by growth rather than raw academic output.

Academically, the two schools are nearly identical: Franklin Avenue Elementary scores 9.6/10 versus Charles H. Kim Elementary's 9.5/10 — a negligible one-tenth-point difference. Where Charles H. Kim separates itself is growth, scoring 9.8/10 compared to Franklin Avenue Elementary's 9.0/10. That 0.8-point growth gap suggests Charles H. Kim is consistently moving students further along the learning curve year over year, regardless of where they start.

The demographic profiles of these two schools diverge sharply. Franklin Avenue Elementary serves 405 students with 28% qualifying for free or reduced lunch, while Charles H. Kim Elementary serves 472 students with 88% qualifying — a 60-percentage-point difference that reflects fundamentally different community contexts. Charles H. Kim's stronger growth score is especially notable given it serves a much higher proportion of economically disadvantaged students. Student-teacher ratio also favors Charles H. Kim at 18.2:1 versus Franklin Avenue Elementary's 23.8:1 — a difference of 5.6 students per teacher that translates to more individual attention per child.

Both schools serve grades KG through 05 and sit just 2.8 miles apart in Los Angeles. The programmatic offerings and grade structures are identical on paper, which makes the growth score and student-teacher ratio the most actionable distinctions for parents weighing a choice between them.