Families on Novato's northeast side are served by Olive Elementary School, about one mile from the downtown area. The school has two entrances -- one on the north side off Plum Street and the other on the south side off Olive Avenue, which is more of a main thoroughfare. The school is one of eight neighborhood elementary schools in the Novato Unified School District. Built in 1952, it has 26 teachers and 20 classrooms on the 13-acre property. The special-day class and kindergarten classes share their own fenced playground and are situated close to the school office. In addition, the upper playground is used by first and second grades while the lower playground and playing field is used by third, fourth and fifth grades. The city of Novato maintains play equipment and an adjacent fenced playing field for extracurricular programs. Olive's API index for the 2009-2010 academic year was 811. The state has set 800 as the score schools should strive to meet. As of the 2009-2010 school year, the ethnic breakdown of the student body included 52.4 percent whites, 36.4 percent Hispanics, 4.0 percent Asian Americans and 2.7 percent African Americans. Twenty-four percent of the students are considered English language learners, just over the 21 percent district average. The socioeconomic status of the families in the Olive area is slightly below the district average, according to district statistics (socioeconomically disadvantaged students are those receiving free or reduced lunch or when neither parent is a high school graduate). Forty percent of the kids are categorized as socioeconomically disadvantaged, with 32.9 percent being the district average. In addition, 42 percent of the parents surveyed had college degrees, just below the district average of 53 percent.