Elementary Schools in Marlboro 01

The five elementary schools in the Marlboro 01 district serve students from pre-kindergarten through eighth grade in a rural South Carolina community, and the district as a whole ranks in the bottom 5% of the state, with all schools carrying a 0-star rating.

For parents, the most important takeaway is that academic proficiency across these schools is well below state averages, and chronic absenteeism is a serious district-wide problem at 38.7%—nearly double the state rate. Clio Elementary stands out as the district’s top performer, ranking 498th in the state and showing the only upward trend, jumping from the 11th to the 23rd percentile in two years. It also has the highest per-student spending at $17,383 and the lowest student-teacher ratio at 9.8, with strong 4th-grade scores (60.7% in ELA and 46.4% in math). In contrast, Bennettsville Intermediate is the lowest-ranked school (629th) despite spending the second-most per student ($13,722), highlighting that money alone doesn’t drive results. McColl Elementary/Middle offers a notable bright spot in math, with 50% proficiency in 8th-grade math—above the state average—and a perfect 100% pass rate on the Algebra 1 end-of-course exam, suggesting a specialized strength worth investigating.

Meanwhile, Bennettsville Primary and Wallace Elementary/Middle fall in between, with all schools facing chronic absenteeism above 31% (McColl is highest at 40.9%). The data also reveals inconsistent performance across grades within schools—for example, McColl drops from 54.7% proficiency in 4th-grade ELA to just 32% in 5th-grade—suggesting curriculum alignment issues. For parents, the key insight is that while no school here is a high performer, Clio’s positive trajectory and McColl’s math success offer glimmers of hope, but addressing the absenteeism crisis is essential for any meaningful improvement.