Four Florida charter schools face closure after receiving multiple F’s under the state’s grading system, but at least two will likely re-open under new management: Their local school districts.
The Tampa Bay Times has detailed the closure of University Preparatory Academy, a charter school that opened three years ago in an academically struggling neighborhood of South St. Petersburg, Fla. Its charter contract is no more, and in its place, its authorizing school district is working to open Midtown Academy, a traditional public school.
The move may not be entirely unprecedented. Pinellas County School district spokeswoman Lisa Wolf said the district has taken over charter schools in the past. But it’s a rare occurrence for a school facing automatic termination under the state’s accountability law, which says charter schools that receive consecutive F’s must close immediately, unless they can show their students’ academic progress exceeds that in surrounding traditional public schools — a standard University Prep was not able to meet.
Meanwhile, in nearby Manatee County, the school board tonight is set to decide whether to convert Just for Girls Academy, a single-gender charter school that catered to disadvantaged elementary school students, into a district-sponsored alternative education program.
The board will vote to revoke the elementary school school contract as required by state statute, because the charter school was given F grades by the state for too many years in a row.
“We’re required to follow statute, however, we do have students that need an environment that is customized just for them,” Manatee County Superintendent Diana Greene said.
So instead of dismantling the program completely, Greene is proposing the board allow the organization to continue educating elementary school students through a contract agreement for an alternative education program. Just for Girls already runs a similar contract-type program for middle school girls in the Jane B. Pratt Alternative Education Center.
“I can just sum it in in a simple sentence: these girls matter to us and we did not want to give up on them,” said Just for Girls CEO Becky Canesse. “We were all committed to not giving up, no matter what.”
Florida is home to 22 charter schools that were converted from traditional schools. In many cases, the conversions happened after communities decided they wanted to preserve local public schools, but restructure them to better serve students. It will be worth watching what happens when conversions happen in reverse.
In Pinellas, Midtown Academy will have to be approved by the state as an entirely new school. It will be open to any student who attended the erstwhile charter for all or part of the 2015-16 school year.
Wolf, the Pinellas school board spokeswoman, said for now, the district is focused on getting ready for next month’s start of school. Long-term decisions about how the school will run and which students will be eligible will come later, after the district gets more input from the community, which has fought a long battle with generational poverty, academic turmoil and school segregation.
