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Schools

Arts magnet stirs worries

Some fear a resegregation of Gibbs High, which has a similar program.

By RITA FARLOW, Times Staff Writer
Published January 22, 2008

A proposal to create a new arts magnet at Tarpon Springs High School has drawn the ire of some parents and students at Gibbs High School, home to a similar program.

Proponents say Tarpon Springs' Leadership Conservatory for the Arts differs from the 24-year-old Pinellas County Center for the Arts at Gibbs. Others say it has enough similarities that it could likely decrease the number of white students, if mid and north county students from predominantly white neighborhoods decide their needs could be met closer to home.

"I'm concerned. I think that it's going to go back to being more segregated," said Angelique Allen, 18, a senior studying musical theater at the Pinellas County Center for the Arts at Gibbs.

Angelique Allen's mother, Andrea Yvette Allen, is the School Advisory Council chair at Gibbs. She said she's been fielding calls from concerned parents.

"They're concerned that we're going to be an all-black school now and not have diversity, and they feel some of the best teachers won't choose Gibbs," she said. "We have some of the best teachers now, and we're thinking some of them are going to transfer out."

Gibbs principal Antelia Campbell has mixed feelings about the situation."The program at Tarpon, if it offers parents an opportunity to be closer to home and be more involved in what their kids are doing, that can't be a bad thing," Campbell said. "Is it going to compete with our program? In some ways, yes."

Several School Board members have said they anticipate interest from enough students throughout the district to justify two arts programs at opposite ends of the county. But the program at Gibbs, which has an enrollment cap of 500 students, isn't full this year and there is no waiting list, Campbell said.

Magnet programs, which gained momentum in the 1980s, were designed to attract students to schools outside their neighborhoods as a means of voluntarily desegregating public schools.

The U.S. Department of Education defines a magnet as a school "that offers a special curriculum capable of attracting substantial numbers of students of different racial backgrounds."

Harry Brown, Pinellas school district superintendent for curriculum and operations, said the term "magnet" has changed over time. The district now considers magnets along the same lines as career academies since both draw students countywide.

"Career academies tend to be more vocational in nature and magnets are more, let's say, liberal arts-focused," Brown said.

A spokeswoman for Magnet Schools of America, the nonprofit educational foundation that works with the federal government's Magnet Schools Assistance Program, said the term has morphed over the years to refer to various types of programs, but that, at its core, it still applies to efforts to maintain diversity.

"The name itself has kind of taken on a broader meaning for a lot of districts," Andrea Mastrobuono said. "But with magnets, the bottom line is historically about reducing long-standing patterns of racial isolation."

Tarpon Springs High School's student body is 82 percent white.

Brown said he thinks Tarpon's program will appeal to south Pinellas students who are interested in the leadership component, thus drawing African-American students to north county.

The medical magnet at Palm Harbor University High draws students from all over the county, Brown said, despite a similar program at Boca Ciega High in Gulfport. Nevertheless, 84 percent of the students at Palm Harbor are white; a little more than 4 percent are black.

Board members are expected to vote on the proposal next week. If approved, students will be able to apply to it during the application period for magnet, fundamental and career academy programs scheduled to begin Feb. 11.

Tarpon Springs principal Kent Vermeer said the district would make every effort to explain to parents the differences between Tarpon's program, which will integrate leadership skills with performing arts, rigorous academics and technology, and the program at Gibbs.

"We'll make a very, very big distinction, because it's not going to be the same experience at both schools," Vermeer said.

But will the distinctions be enough to convince parents that the commute to Gibbs is worth it?

Sue Geier of Tarpon Springs, who is white, had been considering sending her daughter, Moriah to Gibbs. If the magnet at Tarpon is approved, Geier says, she'll probably apply there instead.

That's exactly what worries parents like Sami Leigh Scott, a community activist in south St. Petersburg who worries that schools like Gibbs will become resegregated.

"The parents I've spoken with, both the black as well as the white parents, the concern is that they are going to lose the program. They don't believe that the new magnet is not competing," Scott said. "They do believe that people are going to move away and that is going to reduce the quality of their program."

Times staff writer Donna Winchester contributed to this report. Rita Farlow can be reached at farlow@sptimes.com or 445-4162.

Fast facts:

School enrollment by the numbers

Tarpon Springs High School

1,855 - Total number of students *

1,529 - White students

117 - Black students

209 - Students of all other races **

Gibbs High School

2,163 - Total number of students *

902 - White students

957 - Black students

304 - Students of all other races **

Source: Pinellas County school district.

* Numbers are for the whole school. Magnet program enrollment not available.

** "All other races" includes Asian, Hispanic, American Indian and multiracial.

The U.S. Department of Education defines a magnet school as:

"... A public elementary school, public secondary school, public elementary education center, or public secondary education center that offers a special curriculum capable of attracting substantial numbers of students of different racial backgrounds. Magnet programs aim to eliminate, reduce, or prevent minority group isolation in elementary and secondary schools while strengthening students' knowledge of academic subjects and their grasp of marketable vocational skills. The special curriculum of a magnet school attracts substantial numbers of students from different social, economic, ethnic, and racial backgrounds and provides greater opportunities for voluntary and court-ordered desegregation efforts to succeed."

Source: U.S. Department of Education.

Two Discovery Nights will give program details

Gibbs High School, 850 34th St. S, St. Petersburg, will hold two Discovery Nights in February. Program officials will give a presentation, explain application requirements and deadlines, and give classroom tours.

- 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. Feb. 6, for the Business Economics Technology Academy.

- 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. Feb. 7, for the Pinellas County Center for the Arts.

For information, call the school at 893-5452.

[Last modified January 21, 2008, 21:39:01]