Barton Middle School opened in 1993 and has a long history of academic and extra curricular excellence. It currently serves 6th, 7th, and 8th graders in Hays CISD under the leadership of Aaron Loyd. 

The following info was published in the Hays Free Press Hays CISD 50^th Anniversary Edition Supplement - March 2017:

R.C. “Bob" Barton Sr., namesake of Barton Middle School, was superintendent of the Buda school district during much of the Great Depression and World War II, sometimes doubling as janitor, football coach and volunteer bus driver in lean times. He had served in the cavalry and worked as a cowboy, but he also held a masters in economics from the University of Texas and did post-graduate work at Columbia University in New York. Later, he served as a principal in the Kyle school district, and on the Buda school board where he was an early advocate of integration and an outspoken proponent of merging Buda, Kyle and Wimberley into a Hays Consolidated ISD. With his wife, Marietta, he maintained a love of ranching, operating the Coyote Ranch near where Oak Forrest subdivision is today. After retiring from school work, he and Marietta ran a dairy farm for many years on family land near Mountain City. His son, Bob Barton, Jr., bought the Kyle News while in college on the GI Bill, the newspaper that evolved into what is today the Hays Free Press. Bob Barton Jr. also served in the state legislature. Members of the Barton family continue to own a majority of the newspaper and several members of the family still live on the farm.