Ray Childers Elementary

Ray Childers Elementary is a moderately sized elementary school in Hickory, North Carolina, run under Burke County Schools. The school serves 460 students in grades pre-K through 5.

Burke County Schools comprises 26 schools with combined enrollment of 11,667 students; Ray Childers Elementary is among them.

For racial and ethnic makeup, Ray Childers Elementary lists that the largest single group is White, at 66% of enrollment; the rest reads as 13% Asian, 13% Hispanic, 7% multiracial. By comparison, Burke County as a whole is about 81% White, so the school skews considerably less White than its surroundings.

On the income-and-resources front, On paper, Ray Childers Elementary has 29 full-time-equivalent teachers, translating to a class-load average of around 15.8:1. Statewide, the average ratio sits near 14.9:1, putting Ray Childers Elementary higher than the state norm the norm. An estimated 99% of students are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch, a commonly cited indicator of low-income enrollment.

On a residual basis (actual vs predicted given the student mix), Ray Childers Elementary sits in the middle band of the BeatsExpectations distribution. Schools with this campus's student mix typically land near 48.5%; this one delivers 62.9%.

Around the school, census data for Burke County shows median household income runs about $58,592, roughly 21% of adults have completed at least a four-year degree, and census figures put the poverty rate at about 12%. Ray Childers Elementary is one of 30 public schools in Burke County (combined enrollment of about 12,360 students).

Nearest neighbor: Hildebran Elementary, around 2.5 miles off. Counting just inside five miles, 8 other public schools cluster around Ray Childers Elementary. Among the 8 schools in that immediate cluster with test data (this one included), Ray Childers Elementary ranks 2nd on composite proficiency, higher than the local average of 56.9%.

The school occupies a residential site.

Five-year trend. Over the past 7-year window, the student count stayed largely flat: 457 students in 2018 compared to 460 in 2025. Over the same period, the White share edged down from 77% to 66%.

On this page, members of the Ray Childers Elementary 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.