Bell High School

930 South Main Street

School District

Gilchrist
Grade

6-12
Teacher/Student Ratio

1:12
Type

public

GreatSchools Rating

The school rating calculation is based on four ratings: the Student Progress Rating or Academic Progress Rating, College Readiness Rating, Equity Rating, and Test Score Rating each designed to show different facets of school success. Learn more about GreatSchools Ratings

Reviews

Submitted by student on December 03, 2022

They only just started offering a small selection of advanced courses, so students who want to challenge themselves have to take classes through FLVS (which is very difficult to get through). The staff and teachers don't care much about how their students do, either, and a few of them are open with discrimination towards LGBTQ and colored students.
Submitted by parent on February 19, 2019

All Three of my children graduated from Bell. My oldest with her AA before her diploma, then went on to get a Bachelors and now a Masters. My other two learned vocational skills that served them as they had no interest in a college degree. Bell is a very small community and as such has limited resources. Having said that, they make great use of the resources they have. Students get out of the school based on the effort they put in. In order to get AP style classes a student will need to Dual Enroll in college. If a student is not prepared for college, it is because they did not prepare for college. As to the comment about Bell focusing on Football and FFA. I can only say that is a misguided student. Bell's football program is not even a contender on the lowest division. Students wishing to excel in football do not come to Bell, because the focus at Bell is academics over athletics. Even sports that Bell does do very well in, the students combined GPA is usually in line with or above other schools in the state. I know this because my daughters played sports and my oldest was a 3 time academic award scholar and she didn't even have the highest GPA on the team. Bell does focus on FFA but considering that this is a farming community that seems to make sense. I would encourage parents looking for a school that puts academics before sports to take a closer look at Bell.
Submitted by other on January 23, 2018

I am having an issue even getting my children enrolled. I have been trying since before Winter Break, 12/18/17 I called and was told to enroll my 3 kids online. I did this, however, when the teachers came back to school 1/4/18, I called again and asked if my kids would be able to start 1/9/18 when the kids all start back. I was told no, because they remodeled the website and not all of our information was received. So I tried again, the website was not up. I physically went to the school 1/9/18 and sat in the Counselor's office and tried to enroll my kids, was given a different place to enroll online, I was told I could go to the town Library to do this. I enrolled them again online, and was told I needed 3 forms signed and notarized by my landlord for each child ... and 3 forms signed and notarized from me. This costs money I don't have and my landlord doesn't live here and is sometimes hard to get a hold of. I explained this and asked if my lease would work, I was told no. I had called in the past 2 weeks begging for a way that my kids can start school because I am worried they will be held back or failing by now because they have missed so much school. I finally had a the school truancy officer come out to our home to do a home visit to verify we live here..( a block away from the school) Now I'm being told my kids still can't start school because we don't have any mail yet with our address on it, I offered a bank statement with our address, I was told this would not work. I am currently fighting with Central Florida Electric for a statement, as we have not received a statement as we do the pay as you go. They refuse to fax proof to the school, they want us to drive to Chiefland to pick it up in person, this is ridiculous when we only have one car and I work all the way in Gainesville, my husband has no way to pick it up. This whole process makes me want to pack up and move back to Suwannee County. It is now 1/23/18 and my kids are still not in school........ maybe I should just think about home school at this point.
Submitted by other on April 04, 2013

as a grandparent raising a teenage girl, we like to track of her grades, however, we have a problem trying to figure out the point system. why are there two sets of numbers?