Charles F Hard Elementary School

Charles F Hard Elementary School is one of the tight-knit elementary-level communitys in Bessemer, Alabama, run under Bessemer City, with 364 students on its rolls from grades pre-K through 5. By comparison, Alabama's public schools average about 480 students each, so Charles F Hard Elementary School sits 24% smaller than that benchmark.

Charles F Hard Elementary School is one of 7 schools operated by Bessemer City, a district that caters to 3,012 students overall.

For racial and ethnic makeup, Charles F Hard Elementary School records that nearly all students (87%) are Black. The remainder looks like 7% Hispanic, 4% multiracial. That is meaningfully more Black than the county at large, where the share is closer to 42%.

Looking at school resources, Charles F Hard Elementary School reports 19 full-time-equivalent teachers, putting the student-to-teacher ratio at about 19.2:1. That figure is higher than the state norm's 17.0:1 average. An estimated 81% of students are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch, which schools and policymakers use as a rough income-mix signal. By comparison, Jefferson County runs at roughly 52%, so the school's eligibility rate is somewhat above the surrounding baseline.

With demographic context factored in, Charles F Hard Elementary School performs roughly as the BeatsExpectations model predicts for a school with this FRL share. The predicted value is around 25.3%, the actual is 14.7%, a residual of -10.6 points.

In the broader community, ACS estimates for Jefferson County put median household income runs about $66,388, roughly 36% of adults have completed at least a four-year degree, and the poverty rate sits near 11%. Across Jefferson County's 181 public schools (combined enrollment of about 97,401 students), Charles F Hard Elementary School is one campus in the mix.

Empower Community SchoolLower School is the nearest neighboring public school, about 0.7 miles from this campus. 8 of the 8 nearest public schools sit inside a five-mile radius. On composite proficiency, Charles F Hard Elementary School comes 9th of 9 in the immediate cluster, behind the nearby-schools average of 39.4%.

The school occupies a bedroom-community site.

Five-year trend. Looking back 7 years, enrollment at Charles F Hard Elementary School has remained close to its prior level, going from 357 students in 2018 to 364 in 2025. Black enrollment moved from 96% to 87% across the same window.

On allk12, the feed for Charles F Hard Elementary School typically covers open house dates, ride-share offers, and field-trip permission slips. Posting is open to anyone connected to the school.