Summary:
McCormick Middle is the only middle school in the McCormick 01 district, a small rural district in South Carolina, serving grades 6-8 with just 106 students total—roughly 35 per grade.
This school stands out for its exceptional per-student spending of $29,169, which is far above typical state averages, and its very low student-to-teacher ratio of 9.6:1, meaning your child would likely get a lot of individual attention. The most encouraging news is the school’s dramatic improvement: it jumped from the 19th percentile statewide in 2023-2024 to the 48th percentile in 2025-2026, a 29-point leap in just two years. The strongest academic area is 8th-grade English Language Arts, where 65.7% of students are proficient—beating the state average of 58.9%. There’s also a clear pattern where ELA scores improve as students move up in grade: 6th graders lag the state by 7 points, but by 8th grade they exceed it by nearly 7 points, suggesting literacy interventions gain traction over time.
However, there are challenges. Math proficiency trails the state by 6-9 points in every grade, with 6th grade at 34.9% versus the state’s 40.9%. Science data is only available for 6th grade, where proficiency is 39.5%—12.4 points below the state, the largest gap of any subject. Chronic absenteeism is also a concern at 25.6%, higher than both the district (23.5%) and state (22.3%). Given the small cohort size, year-to-year swings can be dramatic, so it’s wise to view single-year changes cautiously. Still, the upward trajectory in rankings and strong 8th-grade ELA results show real progress, even if the high spending hasn’t yet produced top-tier outcomes across the board.
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