Hayes Cooper Center

As a close-knit elementary-level community in MERIGOLD, Mississippi, Hayes Cooper Center instructs 304 students from grades pre-K through 6, overseen by Cleveland School District. Enrollment runs roughly 32% smaller than the state mean of about 446.

Within Cleveland School District, which oversees 8 schools and 2,793 students, Hayes Cooper Center is one campus in the system.

Looking at the student body, Hayes Cooper Center shows that the largest single group is White at 46%, but no single group is in the majority. Beyond that, the school logs 43% Black, 7% Hispanic, 3% multiracial. By comparison, Bolivar County as a whole is about 31% White, so the school skews considerably more White than its surroundings.

On the resource side, The school employs 21 full-time-equivalent teachers, for a student-teacher ratio near 14.7:1. That figure is tighter than the state norm's 15.9:1 average. Around 100% of the student body qualifies for free or reduced-price meals, a number frequently used as a low-income enrollment indicator.

In the surrounding community, census data for Bolivar County shows median household income runs about $39,585, 28% of adults hold a bachelor's degree or higher, and the poverty rate sits near 27%. Hayes Cooper Center is one of 19 public schools in Bolivar County (combined enrollment of about 4,415 students).

Nearest neighbor: I. T. Montgomery Elementary School, around 2.2 miles off. 8 of the 8 nearest public schools sit inside a ten-mile radius, suggesting a relatively low-density school footprint.

Geographically, the school is in a low-density area.

Trend over the last 7 years. Looking back 7 years, enrollment at Hayes Cooper Center has declined 6%, going from 322 students in 2018 to 304 in 2025. Over the same period, the Asian share ticked down from 5% to 1%.

On the community side, members of the Hayes Cooper Center community share and discuss open house dates, ride-share offers, and field-trip permission slips. Anyone with firsthand experience at this school can post or comment.