Mountain Meadow was ranked the highest performing elementary school in Pierce County — and the 20th highest in all of Washington — according to data recently published by U.S. News & World Report, the digital media company famous for ranking colleges and universities.

In October, U.S. News & World Report announced the 2022 rankings of U.S. K-8 schools — the first time it has ranked elementary and middle schools — and Mountain Meadow Elementary, part of the White River School District in Buckley, took high honors. The rankings are based on students’ performance on state math and reading assessments and overall proficiency in those subjects.

In Washington, out of 1086 total schools, Mountain Meadow tied for 39th place in reading proficiency and tied for 29th in math proficiency, putting it in the top 4 percent for both categories.

Mountain Meadow went up against, and in some cases beat, other competitive K-5 schools in Seattle, Bellevue, Redmond and other high-income urban and suburban communities.

The ranking came as pleasant news, but not a shock, to White River School District assistant superintendent Scott Harrison, who said the Mountain Meadow team has been “very high-performing for a long time.”

“The commitment the team at Mountain Meadow has made, with regards to being a professional learning community, is one of the key elements in their success,” Harrison said. “The teachers have developed … a highly effective system and they take that responsibly very seriously.”

In both subjects, around 85 percent of Mountain Meadow students scored at or above proficiency – well above the White River School District average of 67 percent for both subjects, which is itself above the state average of 54 percent across both subjects.