History:

Cosumnes River is the smallest elementary school in Elk Grove Unified, but it must also be credited with being the oldest school because it stands near the site of the first real school, the original Rhoads School. This school was built by Jared Dixon Sheldon on the Cosumnes River in the 1840s. It was replaced by the new Rhoads School, constructed in 1872. That's the little school that sits today in Elk Grove Park. In the fast paced gold days when miners filled the banks of the Cosumnes, there were many school districts formed to provide education for the children of the families that followed the gold. Districts and their schools named Sebastopol, Katesville, and Live Oak ceased to exist after 1883, but Michigan Bar, Wilson, and Stone House operated until 1947 when they merged as the Cosumnes River Elementary, Rhoads School closed the next year and joined the consolidation. The Cosumnes name is believed to come from ko-sum, a Miwok Indian word for salmon.