Carl Smith Middle

Carl Smith Middle, an one-room-style 6-8 campus in Terra Bella, California, run under Terra Bella Union Elementary, works with 262 students, covering grades 6 through 8. By comparison, California's public schools average about 659 students each, so Carl Smith Middle sits 60% leaner than that benchmark.

Within Terra Bella Union Elementary, which oversees 2 schools and 717 students, Carl Smith Middle is one campus in the system.

Demographically, Carl Smith Middle lists that 98% of students identify as Hispanic, making the school strongly Hispanic-majority. By comparison, Tulare County as a whole is about 67% Hispanic, so the school skews meaningfully more Hispanic than its surroundings.

On the resource side, Staff filings list 13 full-time-equivalent teachers, which works out to roughly 20.1:1 students per teacher. The state averages about 20.7:1, putting this campus right in line with peers. An estimated 93% of students are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch, which schools and policymakers use as a rough income-mix signal. That share is above Tulare County's rate of about 77%.

With demographic context factored in, Carl Smith Middle tracks the demographic baseline. The model predicts 24.0% given the school's FRL share; actual proficiency is 30.8%.

Across the wider county, census data for Tulare County shows median household income runs about $71,300, roughly 17% of adults have completed at least a four-year degree, and roughly 15% of residents live below the federal poverty line. In all, Tulare County runs 196 public schools (combined enrollment of about 101,494 students), of which Carl Smith Middle is one.

The closest other public school is Terra Bella Elementary, roughly 0.2 miles away. Within five miles, there are 3 other public schools. On composite proficiency, Carl Smith Middle comes 8th of 9 in the immediate cluster, below the nearby-schools average of 36.7%.

The campus sits in a low-density setting.

Over the past 7-year window. Over the past 7-year window, the student count fell 12%: 297 students in 2018 compared to 262 in 2025. Class-load math has fell: from 25.8:1 in 2018 to 20.1:1 in 2025.

On this page, posts here usually surface around classroom updates, athletics, and weather closures. Members of the school community can share what they know.