2023-24 School Grades Are In — So, How Did New Tampa’s Schools Fare? 

The chart above shows the letter grades received by all eleven public schools located in New Tampa after both the 2022-23 and 2023-24 school years. 

As the 2024-25 School Year gets under way, schools are learning how they fared last year, according to state measurements. 

The Florida Department of Education (FDoE) released school grades for the 2023-24 school year on July 24, assigning a “B” grade for Hillsborough County Schools as a whole. Hillsborough has maintained a B rating since 2016. 

All of New Tampa’s schools earned either an A, B, or C grade. 

While eight of the 11 New Tampa public schools maintained the same grade as last year, Liberty Middle School improved from a B to an A. Two schools dropped a letter grade, with both Heritage and Tampa Palms Elementary (TPE) schools moving from an A to a B. 

TPE principal Angela Gluth explained the disappointing letter grade change. 

“While we look forward to the results of state testing, we were disappointed to have missed an A grade by 1 percentage point,” she says. “However, the scores that make up the state grade do not fully represent the growth and progress we have seen our students make throughout the course of the school year.” 

She explains that TPE actually showed gains in proficiency for math students in grades 3-5 and also in 5th grade science, when compared with the previous school year. She says the school also, “celebrates the growth of student learners in primary grades, which are not reflected in the school grade report.” 

Gluth adds, “We are excited to start this new school year and can’t wait to build on the achievements our students have made.” 

Five New Tampa schools maintained their A status, including Benito Middle School, Chiles Elementary, Clark Elementary, Hunter’s Green Elementary and Pride Elementary. 

Benito’s history of As goes all the way back to 2002. 

Principal Brent Williams says it’s definitely a team effort that helps create such consistently excellent performance. 

“I’m extremely proud of the kids,” he says, “and we also have an awesome staff here. They work extremely hard and we always try to provide opportunities for kids to think outside the box and make school fun.” 

Williams says a new opportunity for student growth this year is that Benito is now a Cambridge Lower Secondary School. This is an affiliation that already had been established at Liberty. 

The Cambridge Lower Secondary designation helps prepare students to take Cambridge Advanced International Certificate of Education (AICE) courses in high school. Upon completion of an AICE diploma, which is offered at both of New Tampa’s high schools, a student receives a Florida Bright Futures scholarship, which can pay for up to 100% of college tuition. 

Williams says the hard work of teachers and students at Benito, and the support of families, is what helps the school continue to grow and improve every year. 

Hillsborough County Superintendent of Schools Van Ayres echoes this sentiment in a statement about school grades. 

“We couldn’t have done this without the Hillsborough County community,” he says. “We are excited with our momentum and are ready for the new year to start so we can continue our work.” 

More information about school grades not just in Hillsborough County but across Florida is available online at FLDoE.org/accountability/accountability-reporting/school-grades

Parents Have Tough School Choices To Make

Schools are not just re-opening this fall, they have to re-open.

The President tweets it; the Governor repeats it. 

With the rising and record number of positive Covid-19 cases and deaths in Florida seemingly finding no ceiling, that leaves parents with one of the toughest decisions — whether to send their children back to brick-and-mortar schools or have them learn online — many of them have ever had to make.

Jaclyn Lewis-Croswell, the parent of a fourth-grader at Turner/Bartels K-8 school, will be keeping her daughter home in the fall to learn online. It’s not ideal, she says, but for her, the risk of infection outweigh the benefits of social interaction and classroom learning.

She certainly understands anyone who chooses the opposite for their kids, sympathizing with those who trust the safety measures and some studies that say children aren’t as affected by the virus, while also worrying their children’s mental health may suffer in a detached, online setting.

But, when Jaclyn looked at the rising numbers, “I felt like there is a potential risk of losing my child,” she says. “And that’s not a chance I’m willing to take.”

If Covid-19 continues to rage at its current rate, there remains a chance that schools will not open by August or will be completely online, at least until January. But, as of now, school is moving forward with an expected start date of Aug. 24, with Hillsborough County’s schools offering three different options:

• Option A: A return to traditional, face-to-face, brick-and-mortar schooling, with special social distancing and enhanced disinfecting measures implemented, as well as requiring all students, teachers and staff to wear masks at all times.

• Option B: eLearning full-time through the students’ assigned schools. Students will participate in a distance learning program from home, taught by teachers at their school through Canvas, a new Learning Management System which will replace Edsby. Daily log-ins and attendance will be required.

• Option C: Hillsborough Virtual K-12, a web-based curriculum taught by teachers from Hillsborough County, but not the same as the eLearning program. For grades 6-12, Hillsborough Virtual K-12 and Florida Virtual School (FLVS) are the same, except Hillsborough Virtual K-12 will follow the District’s 2020-21 school calendar, meaning they have more stringent start-and-stop deadlines.

Earlier today, Hillsborough County Schools tweeted out declaration-of-intent results so far. With 115,001 responses tallied, 56,488 families have selected on-site learning, 48,410 have chosen eLearning and 10,103 have picked Hillsborough Virtual K-12.

The Neighborhood News spoke with multiple New Tampa families about their respective decisions. Here are three stories about how some of those parents made their decisions.

Cindy and Connor Kelly both feel the decision to stick with online learning is the safest way forward

Cindy Kelly – eLearning

When schools abruptly closed in March due to the coronavirus, teachers and students were thrown into an online system of learning that ended up receiving mixed reviews. 

While some found the spring experience underwhelming and ineffective, others, like Wharton’s Connor Kelly, thrived in that environment.

So this fall, Connor plans to spend his senior year again learning outside of the classroom as he prepares for college.

“He had no desire go back to the bricks and mortar,” his mom Cindy says. “I was kind of surprised by it myself.”

Cindy says that if Connor had expressed a desire to return to school, the coronavirus would have definitely caused her some concern. In fact, Connor says a big part of his decision stems from his own concerns about passing anything onto his parents. 

“It really does seem like people are really concerned about the virus and weighing it with the social aspect and the isolation (of online) learning,” Cindy says. “It’s a miserable, tough decision to make.”

Thankfully, Connor found the flexibility of online learning to his liking last spring, and looks forward to continuing it. He says, however, that a slight majority of friends in his social circles say they are returning to brick and mortar.

“They want to be able to have that social interaction,” he says, “although, the way it sounds, there probably won’t be too much social interacting allowed anyway.”

He regrets having to miss some, or, depending upon the virus, all of his senior year. He is serving as president of Rho Kappa, the social studies honor society, and isn’t sure he’ll get to make his induction speech, and says he also had roles in other clubs he will miss, as well as the other social benefits of his last year in high school.

“It kind of sucks,” Connor says. “I had a whole meticulous plan laid out for the last three years…I spent a lot of time designing my senior year, and then a rock was thrown through it. But that’s okay, it’s a life lesson.”

Lisa and Eric Ling, with their kids Elijah and Ethan, think its time to get kids back to school, with increased safety standards.

Lisa Ling — Traditional School

Lisa Ling is sending her kids back to school.

While the mother of a first- and fourth-grader at Hunter’s Green Elementary (HGE) understands the risks associated with the brick-and-mortar option this year, she also feels better about her decision now that masks are going to be required.

“Getting kids back to school is what needs to happen,” she says.

Ling and her husband Eric aren’t alone. A recent thread on Facebook she participated in showed more than a dozen parents who agreed with them, and she says many of her friends are following suit.

Ling says it wasn’t really that tough of a decision. “Well, I really did not consider Hillsborough Virtual K-12 or Florida Virtual, because we love our school and didn’t want to disconnect from it,” Ling says. “The (Covid) numbers are going up, but it’s a very low percentage of the population. We feel that there also is evidence coming out that young kids just don’t transmit it as much. Our whole family is healthy, no one has a compromised immune system or lives with an elderly grandparent. God forbid, if one of us gets it, we’ll be okay.”

Lisa has been a stay-at-home mom for nine years. When her children were forced to learn from home in the spring, she says she didn’t find it to be a fruitful experience.

Her third grader was fairly independent unless he would click on the wrong thing while working from his computer, and her youngest, who was in kindergarten, needed constant support. 

She didn’t find the quality of the education to be what it should either, but understands it was a difficult, thrown-together situation for everyone.

“It wasn’t the same as being at school,” she says.

Lisa will no longer be a stay-at-home mom this fall. She is returning as a school psychologist at Benito Middle and Clark Elementary schools. She says her new job did not affect her decision.

“Even if I hadn’t taken that job, I was sending them back,” she says.

(l.-r.) Hector, Grayson and Laurie Gonzalez decided   eLearning will work best for them this fall.

Laurie Gonzalez eLearning

As a teacher, Laurie Gonzalez isn’t sure how she would keep her students safe from the spread of Covid-19, much less her son Grayson, who would be attending sixth grade at Benito Middle School on school choice this fall if she hadn’t decided to keep him home for eLearning.

“I made the choice to do eLearning for my child because I don’t think it is safe for anyone to return at this point,” says Laurie.

By choosing school-based eLearning through his assigned school, as opposed to the other online options, Grayson can keep his seat and if Covid-19 is ever brought under control, he can return after the fall semester. 

“Of course I worry about social interaction, but at what cost?,” she says. “At least today, kids have video games and phones so they can keep in contact with their friends. It isn’t the same but, for now, it will have to do.”

Laurie has read the CDC guidelines and imagines what she and her co-workers’ classrooms would look like in the Covid-19 age. She doesn’t like what she sees.

“I know first-hand that it will be impossible to follow the CDC’s guidelines to keep kids safe from Covid, especially if we reopen schools at full capacity,” she says. “There is not enough room in most classrooms to space kids 3 feet apart for testing, so 6 feet is just not going to happen.”

A mask mandate is a great decision, Laurie says, “but I don’t believe it will be enough.  As soon as we open schools, I anticipate the number of Covid cases will skyrocket.”

Laurie, who teaches at Turner/Bartels K-8 School, says she has an auto-immune disease, and is nervous about the impact Covid-19 would have on her if she were to get it.

With so many unknowns, Laurie and her husband Hector have no idea when it will be completely safe again to return to school — for her or her students. She feels fairly certain that August won’t be it.

“Yes, I am very confident that coronavirus will still be a problem in August,” she says. “We haven’t seen the numbers (of deaths) that will correlate with the 4th of July yet, but I don’t have much faith that they will be good.”

Local Schools To Benefit If Half-Cent Education Sales Tax Passes Next Month

The heat isn’t going away. Neither, then, are the uncomfortable conditions still being faced by many students in Hillsborough County, where the air conditioning systems at some schools appear to be held together by staples and duct tape.

Looking to address that situation, as well as many others, the Hillsborough County School Board (HCSB) voted to place a referendum on the General Election ballot on Tuesday, November 6, to help fill a gap in funding that has led to myriad of problems in our schools.

A half-cent sales tax increase referendum was hurried and approved in late August by the School Board, despite concerns the chances of passage would be hurt by competing against a transportation referendum already asking for a one-cent sales tax increase.

The education referendum for Hillsborough County Public Schools, the eighth-largest school system in the country, would raise an anticipated $131 million annually, or $1.3 billion over 10 years. Nearly half of that would go to fixing or replacing air conditioning systems in roughly 200 of the county’s 250 schools.

In New Tampa, every school would have its air conditioning systems replaced or overhauled by 2023, with the exception of Hunter’s Green and Tampa Palms elementary schools and Turner/Bartels K-8, all of which would have theirs done between 2023-28.

Every school in Hillsborough County is expected to receive at least $500,000 of benefit from the tax.

School Superintendent Jeff Eakins has been on the town hall circuit this month and last, visiting schools across the county (see picture).

He held a town hall at Wharton High on Oct. 1.

Ahead of his New Tampa visit, the Hillsborough County School District released a list on Sept. 21 of 1,785 projects that would be funded by the tax increase.

Here are the projects for New Tampa schools to be funded by the tax:

Benito Middle School — Years 1-5:  Air Conditioning Replacement or Overhaul, Carpeting Replacement Project, Generator Project, Hard-Surface Flooring Replacement Project, Repave Athletic Tracks, Replace Security System, School Interior Repainting Project

Years 6-10:  Replace Fire Alarm System

Chiles Elementary School Years 1-5:  Air Conditioning Replacement or Overhaul, Carpeting Replacement Project, Fire Evacuation Improvements, Hard-Surface Flooring Replacement Project, K-3 Playground Replacement, Replace Fire Alarm System

Years 6-10: Grade 4-5 Playground Replacement

Clark Elementary Years 1-5: Air Conditioning Replacement or Overhaul, Carpeting Replacement Project, Fire Evacuation Improvements, Grade 4-5 Playground Replacement, Hard-Surface Flooring Replacement Project, Replace Fire Alarm System

Years 6-10: Replace Aging Roof, K-3 Playground Replacement, Pre-K Playground Replacement

Freedom High Years 1-5:  Air Conditioning Replacement or Overhaul, Carpeting Replacement Project, Elevator Modernization, Hard-Surface Flooring Replacement Project, Upgrade Classroom Network Infrastructure, Generator Project. 

Years 6-10:  Replace Aging Roof, Repave Athletic Tracks, Sand and Recondition Gym Floor, School Interior Repainting Project

Heritage Elementary —  Years 1-5: Air Conditioning Replacement or Overhaul, Fire Evacuation Improvements, Hard-Surface Flooring Replacement Project, School Interior Repainting Project, Upgrade Classroom Network Infrastructure

Years 6-10: Grade 4-5 Playground Replacement, K-3 Playground Replacement, Pre-K Playground Replacement

Hunter’s Green Elementary — Years 1 to 5:  Fire Evacuation Improvements, Grade 4-5 Playground Replacement, K-3 Playground Replacement, Replace Aging Roof, Replace Stage Lighting, Upgrade Classroom Network Infrastructure

Years 6-10: Air Conditioning Replacement or Overhaul, Exterior Paint and Waterproofing, Outdoor Court Replacement

Liberty Middle School — Years 1-5:  Air Conditioning Replacement or Overhaul, Exterior Paint and Waterproofing, School Interior Repainting Project, Upgrade Classroom Network Infrastructure

Years 6-10: Elevator Modernization, Replace Fire Alarm System, Replace Telephone System, Sand and Recondition Gym Floor

Pride Elementary — Years 1-5: Air Conditioning Replacement or Overhaul, Fire Evacuation Improvements, Grade 4-5 Playground Replacement, Pre-K Playground Replacement, Replace Aging Roof

Years 6-10: Elevator Modernization, K-3 Playground Replacement, Outdoor Court Replacement, Replace Telephone System

Tampa Palms Elementary — Years 1-5: Grade 4-5 Playground Replacement, K-3 Playground Replacement, Replace Stage Lighting

Years 6-10: Air Conditioning Replacement or Overhaul, Carpeting Replacement Project, Generator Project, Hard-Surface Flooring Replacement Project, Outdoor Court Replacement

Turner Bartels K-8 School — Years 1-5:  K-3 Playground Replacement, Pre-K Playground Replacement

Years 6-10:  Air Conditioning Replacement or Overhaul, Elevator Modernization, Outdoor Court Replacement, Repave Athletic Tracks, Replace Telephone System, School Interior Repainting Project

Wharton High Years 1-5:  Air Conditioning Replacement or Overhaul, Fire Evacuation Improvements, Replace Aging Roof, Replace Fire Alarm System

Years 6 to 10: Carpeting Replacement Project, Repave Athletic Tracks, Sand and Recondition Gym Floor, School Interior Repainting Project

Wiregrass Ranch gets relief, GGG gets a zone with proposal

rezoning
These are the new zones proposed for Wesley Chapel for the 2016-17 school year.

Wesley Chapel’s newest high school is set to open off Old Pasco Rd. next fall. While High School GGG may not have an official name yet, it does now have a proposed zone with a pool of students to draw from in order to fill its hallways.

Wiregrass Ranch and Wesley Chapel high schools, as well as Dr. John Long and Thomas Weightman middle schools, are getting some much needed relief, and Seven Oaks, a vocal community in the process, survived unscathed despite concerns from residents it would be chopped up to achieve the county’s goals.

A third meeting to determine the new school’s boundaries was held on Thursday morning in Wesley Chapel High’s media center, with the Pasco’s School Boundary Committee (SBC) debating 14 options. It swiftly moved through most of the options before option 12 emerged as the choice.

GGG will draw from a swath of homes that line the west side of I-75, extending from north of Old Pasco Rd. all the way down to County Line Rd.

The most congested school in Pasco County is Wiregrass Ranch High (WRH), which currently has 2,495 students (which means it is at 153 percent of its capacity of 1,633), and its primary feeder school, Dr. John Long Middle School (JLMS).

JLMS, with 1,870 students, currently is at 147 percent of its capacity of 1,327. And, both schools are located in the fast-growing Wiregrass Ranch Development of Regional Impact (DRI), so something had to be done to accommodate an ever-growing number of students.

The option adopted reduces WRH by 782 students, or 31 percent. That leaves it only 80 students over capacity, and would eliminate the need for 10-period schools days, something the school had to resort to beginning in 2015-16 because of overcrowding.

JLMS is reduced by 612 students, or 33 percent, putting it 69 students under capacity.

WCH, which was already over capacity, gains 45 students, and is at 114 percent capacity, while TWM picks up 43 students, and is at 126 percent capacity.

To get to those numbers, WRH and JLMS students currently zoned for those two schools but living in communities on the western edge of the current boundary like Country Walk, Fox Ridge, Meadow Pointe III and IV, Wyndfields and Union Park will now be re-zoned to attend Wesley Chapel High and Weightman Middle.

For some students, such as those living in Meadow Pointe III and Union Park, that means a much longer drive to school, which was considered.

Wesley Chapel principal Hetzler-Nettles and Wiregrass Ranch principal Robyn White say the hardest thing about the process was trying to consider future growth in the plans. An Epperson Ranch development as part of of potential Connected City project could bring major growth to Wesley Chapel, while the Wiregrass Ranch area continues to expand as well.

“You just don’t know,” White said. “It’s hard to look into the future without knowing who will be in all these new locations.”

The SBC, which is made up of staff representatives from every school as well as parents from each and led by the director of planning for the Pasco School District, Chris Williams, will present Option 12 to the public on Tuesday, November 29 (where parents will be in attendance and allowed to weigh in) — before the Pasco County School Board can vote to approve them or not.

“I thought it went well,” said Hetzler-Nettles. “I came in thinking one way and ended up choosing an option that wasn’t even on the table in the second meeting.”

Hetzler-Nettles said her only surprise was that it passed unanimously.

Roughly 25 parents were on hand to watch the process, most from Seven Oaks. When Option 20, the last one to recommend re-zoning Seven Oaks, was voted out, a small, collective sigh could be heard.

A group of residents called Seven Oaks Voice submitted a six-page recommendation at the Sept. 29 meeting, and revised it for Thursday’s meeting, hoping to spare their subdivisions — which are located east of I-75 and north of S.R. 56 — from being broken up.

According to maps provided by the county, 20 percent of the current WRH population, or 509 students, live in Seven Oaks, and 22 percent of JLMS enrollment, or 414 students, live there as well. If the plan is to reduce the student bodies at those schools, an examination of Seven Oaks was unavoidable, and in fact, 10 of the 14 options called for either splitting up the community or re-zoning it for GGG or WCH.

In its proposal, Seven Oaks Voice suggested beginning the rezoning process with communities located west of I-75 (Westbrook Estates, Lexington Oaks, etc.), as well as those east of Meadow Pointe Blvd. (Union Park, Windsor, Country Walk and the Double Branch Elementary zone).

The recommendation said the current Seven Oaks DRI provides stability and won’t be a future strain due to limited future growth potential, while the other communities are in high-growth areas. Seven Oaks Voice also suggested that established communities should have priority over newer communities with the same proximity to JLMS and WRH.

Also, by leaving Seven Oaks in its current school zone, the county also can avoid transportation issues, as it claims the subdivision is one of the furthest away from GGG.

The SBC was charged with considering socio-economic balance, maintaining feeder patterns, future growth in certain areas (especially in Wiregrass Ranch), transportation and subdivision integrity before finalizing a proposal.