Beecher Hills Elementary School vs Parkside Elementary School

Parkside Elementary School holds the higher overall rating at 9.1/10 compared to Beecher Hills Elementary School's 8.8/10 — a 0.3-point gap. The state rank difference is more striking: Parkside sits at #50 of 2268 Georgia elementary schools, while Beecher Hills ranks #115 of 2268. Both are strong performers in the top 5% of the state, but Parkside's rank places it among Georgia's most elite elementary programs by composite score.

The academic and growth scores tell a nuanced story. Beecher Hills Elementary School edges Parkside Elementary School on raw academic proficiency, 7.6/10 versus 7.4/10. Parkside, however, dominates on growth — a 9.9/10 compared to Beecher Hills' 9.1/10. That 0.8-point growth gap means Parkside is accelerating student achievement at a measurably faster rate year over year, which can matter more to families evaluating long-term trajectory than a single proficiency snapshot.

The two schools serve very different populations across the 5.7 miles separating them. Beecher Hills Elementary School enrolls 252 students — less than half of Parkside Elementary School's 603 — and carries an 80% free and reduced lunch rate compared to Parkside's 48%. Beecher Hills also runs a significantly lower student-teacher ratio of 10.1:1 versus Parkside's 13.7:1, meaning each child gets meaningfully more direct teacher time on average. That ratio gap partly reflects the smaller enrollment, but it translates to a more intimate classroom environment regardless of cause.

Both schools serve grades PK through 5, so families are not choosing between different grade spans. The structural differences — Beecher Hills' smaller size, lower ratio, and higher-poverty population versus Parkside's larger enrollment, superior growth score, and stronger composite rank — are the real deciding factors for most families.