HAMMETT BOWEN JR. ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

HAMMETT BOWEN JR. ELEMENTARY SCHOOL operates as a big elementary campus in OCALA, Florida, part of MARION. Current enrollment sits at 1,010 students spanning grades pre-K through 5. Enrollment runs roughly 67% bigger than the state mean of about 604.

MARION runs 62 schools in total, collectively educating 46,349 students. HAMMETT BOWEN JR. ELEMENTARY SCHOOL is one of those campuses.

On the student-mix side, HAMMETT BOWEN JR. ELEMENTARY SCHOOL records that the largest single group is Hispanic at 43%, but no single group is in the majority. The remainder looks like 35% White, 15% Black, 5% multiracial, 3% Asian. That is meaningfully more Hispanic than the county at large, where the share is closer to 17%.

On the income-and-resources front, Staff filings list 52 full-time-equivalent teachers, which works out to roughly 19.4:1 students per teacher. That figure is higher than the state norm's 17.5:1 average. Around 50% of the student body qualifies for free or reduced-price meals, which schools and policymakers use as a rough income-mix signal.

After controlling for student poverty, HAMMETT BOWEN JR. ELEMENTARY SCHOOL performs roughly as the BeatsExpectations model predicts for a school with this FRL share. The predicted value is around 55.9%, the actual is 53.8%, a residual of -2.0 points.

In the surrounding community, Marion County reports that median household income runs about $61,010, 23% of adults hold a bachelor's degree or higher, and the poverty rate sits near 10%. Across Marion County's 68 public schools (combined enrollment of about 46,349 students), HAMMETT BOWEN JR. ELEMENTARY SCHOOL is one campus in the mix.

LIBERTY MIDDLE SCHOOL is the nearest neighboring public school, about 0.2 miles from this campus. Within five miles, there are 5 other public schools. Ranking that nearby cluster on reported proficiency puts HAMMETT BOWEN JR. ELEMENTARY SCHOOL at 2nd of 9; the average score across the group is 49.4%.

Geographically, the school is in an outlying area.

Trend over the last 7 years. Looking back 7 years, enrollment at HAMMETT BOWEN JR. ELEMENTARY SCHOOL has ticked up 23%, going from 819 students in 2018 to 1,010 in 2025. White enrollment moved from 46% to 35% across the same window. Class-load math has loosened: from 15.8:1 in 2018 to 19.4:1 in 2025.

On allk12, posts here usually surface around fundraisers, lost-and-found posts, and report-card season. Contributors range from current parents to recent graduates and teachers.