Weather | Sports | Forums | Comics | Classifieds | Calendar | Movies
REBECCA RICHARDSA magnet school, two charter schools and an expanded Montessori School are new options for students in South Tampa.
SOUTH TAMPA - As administrators, teachers and students march back to class next week, some will go to new or revamped schools.
A new magnet and two new charter schools are among those greeting students in the South Tampa area. In the private sector, a Montessori school is adding classrooms.
Here's a look at some of the changes planned for the 2003-04 year.
- Montessori Children's House of Hyde Park is opening its fifth building in a former medical office at 2416 W Cleveland St., across from the main campus.
The 5,000-square-foot building will have classroom space for an additional 84 children ages 6 to 12. So far, the school has filled about half of that for this school year, said Roberta Fernandez, administrative director.
The addition includes a media center and computer room. The school also has added a fourth class for children ages 3 to 6 at its main campus at 201 S Armenia Ave. in Parkview.
The school serves about 140 students up to age 12.
"It's the end of our dream come true," said Amanda Linton-Evans, director of education.
The school plans an open house at the new building from 10 a.m. to noon Aug. 9.
Maria Montessori founded the individual education concept in Rome in 1907. The Hyde Park school is accredited by the Association Montessori Internationale.
-Anderson Elementary Academy, a new charter school on the top floor of the St. James House of Prayer Episcopal Church in Tampa Heights, will welcome 80 kindergarteners and first-graders.
"One size doesn't fit all," said Loretta Anderson, founder and director of the academy at 2708 Central Ave.
Charters receive state money but are operated by private individuals or organizations. The not-for-profit Anderson Foundation Inc. and a board of directors run the academy.
The board hopes to raise $100,000 to supplement the $150,000 charter startup money and the approximately $3,000 per student the school receives from the state. The school also is applying for a $157,000 Walton Foundation grant.
Anderson targets students from Tampa Heights who may be disadvantaged. For adults, it offers parenting and literacy classes.
- George Foxx, a former teacher and coach at Webb Middle School and Blake High School, takes the helm at the new Mount Pleasant Standard Based Middle School in West Tampa.
"We're stressing the 3 R's and cultural awareness," says George Foxx, who graduated from high school in Miami and began teaching after retiring from the U.S. Navy and receiving advanced degrees.
The charter school will have 125 students in Grades 6-8 who will study in portables behind the Mount Pleasant Missionary Baptist Church at 2002 N Rome Ave. The school will focus on reading, test-taking, spelling and grammar, Foxx said.
"We are home of the diamonds," he said. "The students may be a little rough, but we will polish them all up."
Like other charters, the school received state startup money and will be run by a board of directors.
- Lockhart Elementary School opens as a magnet school this fall, one year after it received an F grade from the state.
New federal standards allowed parents from Lockhart and three other Hillsborough County schools that received failing grades to send their children to a better-performing school.
Lockhart improved to a C this year but already had planned to open as a magnet for the arts using money it received from a federal grant.
"We will have TV production, dance, theater, drama, music and technology," says Principal Tracye Brown. "And I'd love to get our own radio station, perhaps within a one-mile radius."
The school at 3719 N 17th St. in Belmont/Jackson Heights will have neighborhood children and up to 500 kindergarteners through fifth-graders in the magnet program. Head Start students and prekindergarteners also will join the lineup.
-Booker T. Washington Middle School at 1407 Estelle St. in Ybor City will be closed this year and will reopen in 2004 as a K-5 elementary school.
In the meantime, Booker students will attend Williams Middle Magnet School for International Studies at 5020 N 47th St.
Booker students had the option of going to different schools but nearly all chose Williams, said Pat Harrell, principal at Williams.
Students from Oak Park Elementary also will attend Williams. They will have classes in portables until administrators find a new site for the school. Oak Park had to leave 4302 Ellicott St. because of road construction at Interstate 4 and 50th Street.
School district officials gave Oak Park parents several choices, including Brooker, Gibsonton, Ippolito, Kingswood, Mintz or Sims elementaries, said district spokeswoman Linda Cobbe.
The state Department of Transportation paid the school district $11-million for the Oak Park building. It will not reopen as an elementary school.