TALLAHASSEE -- State Democratic leaders are adding their voices to the controversy surrounding Florida's bid for federal Race to the Top stimulus funds.
In a letter released Friday, the ranking members of House education committees asked Education Commissioner Eric J. Smith to "urgently revise" the application which teachers' unions have said they' [...]
BROOKSVILLE – Count Hernando in the race. Tentatively, anyway.
The School Board voted 3 to 1 Thursday to send a letter to the Florida Department of Education stating its intent to participate in the state’s effort to garner millions of grant dollars through the federal government’s Race to the Top program.
The [...]
BROOKSVILLE -- The Hernando health and physical education teacher who admitted to smoking marijuana earlier this year pleaded Tuesday night for mercy from the School Board and got his job back – again.
Michael Provost, the 38-year-old former health and physical education teacher at Parrott Middle School who has been on [...]
BROOKSVILLE -- If Hernando’s gifted center is to be moved from Explorer K-8 in Spring Hill to ease overcrowding there and offer more opportunities for the district’s high-performing students, the center should go to Challenger K-8.
That’s the recommendation from school district staffers and a gifted advisory council comprised of parents, teachers, [...]
TAMPA -- A Hillsborough charter school committee is strongly opposing applications by the national Imagine Schools chain and Fort Lauderdale-based Mavericks in Education to open schools in the district.
Those applications are coming before the Hillsborough County School Board on Tuesday, and superintendent MaryEllen Elia could make an independent recommendation. [...]
BROOKSVILLE -- A short list of superintendent candidates is now headed for the Hernando County School Board.
A search committee Wednesday night trimmed a list of 15 candidates down to nine. Among them are the two internal hopefuls, current interim superintendent Sonya Jackson and Ken Pritz, a former executive director of [...]
TAMPA -- It all comes down to a phone call.
At 1:45 pm. Thursday, officials from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation have scheduled a news conference to announce which school districts will spearhead a national education reform effort.
Yesterday the Hillsborough County School Board approved a $100 million grant agreement [...]
BROOKSVILLE – Pat Fagan is back in the chairman’s seat for the Hernando School Board, though the process to pick him got a little awkward Tuesday night.
Dianne Bonfield, who had been chairwoman until giving up the position in September because she refused to sign interim superintendent Sonya Jackson’s contract, nominated [...]
BROOKSVILLE – Citing his gripes about his new assignment, the Hernando School Board has rejected an agreement to reinstate a teacher who’d been suspended for drug use.
All five board members during Tuesday’s regular meeting expressed disgust for Michael Provost’s comments published Saturday in a regional edition of the St. Petersburg [...]
TAMPA -- The Hillsborough County School Board is expected to vote this afternoon on a final agreement to accept a $100 million teacher effectiveness grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Follow the link to read more.
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[...]SPRING HILL — A former Hernando County ESOL paraprofessional who now works as a secretary for Springstead High School in Spring Hill wants to help lead the school district.
Nilsa Colon Toro, 61, of Spring Hill, has pre-filed to run for the District 1 Hernando School Board seat currently held by [...]
BROOKSVILLE — Central High School will soon have its next principal – and so will three other Hernando schools.
Joe Clifford, currently principal at J.D Floyd K-8 in Spring Hill, will take the empty seat at Central left by Dennis McGeehan, interim superintendent Sonya Jackson announced in an e-mail to district [...]
BROOKSVILLE – A search committee has trimmed the list of Hernando superintendent candidates to 16.
The nine-member committee, meeting for the first time Wednesday night to narrow down a total of 29 applicants, cut two who didn’t meet the minimum qualifications and one whose application arrived late.
Committee member Joe Vitalo, president of the Hernando [...]
TAMPA -- As we reported today and last August in the St. Petersburg Times, the Hillsborough County schools may be holding a $100 million lottery ticket from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
If it won, the district would use the money to revamp its teacher evaluation system; add [...]
BROOKSVILLE — The applicants hail from 11 states and four Florida counties. Three currently serve as school superintendents, and four are in assistant or associate superintendent roles. Ten would bring a doctoral degree.
The Hernando School District has 27 candidates for its top spot. As expected, Hernando’s current interim superintendent Sonya Jackson [...]
BROOKSVILLE -- One Hernando School Board candidate says he’s so passionate about enacting change, he’s willing to move for the chance.
Meanwhile, the current board member whose seat Keane Chapman is gunning for says she still hasn’t decided whether she will run for re-election.
Chapman, 40, currently lives with his wife and two [...]
TAMPA -- In 2007, Wharton High School basketball coach Jaymee Wallace was sentenced to three years in prison for having sex with one of her 15-year-old students.
Now her victim is suing the Hillsborough County school district for alleged negligence, first by hiring Wallace and then by failing to inform her [...]
BROOKSVILLE -- A veteran Hernando County principal has been tapped to open the county’s newest high school.
Interim superintendent Sonya Jackson has selected Central High School principal Dennis McGeehan to serve as principal at the yet-to-be-named school north of Weeki Wachee set to open next fall.
McGeehan’s selection must be approved by [...]
BROOKSVILLE -- The Hernando School Board is headed toward a compromise with the Parrott Middle School health teacher who admitted to and tested positive for marijuana use last March.
The board, during a special meeting Tuesday, reached a consensus on a deal with Michael Provost that would keep him employed by [...]
TAMPA -- Vaccinations against the H1N1 virus will be starting Tuesday morning at a few Hillsborough County schools, officials said Friday.
The first swine flu inoculations will be given to students with chronic health conditions and others who fall into high risk groups.
Other school districts in the Tampa Bay region [...]
BROOKSVILLE -- Interim school superintendent Sonya Jackson on Wednesday asked Marcia Austin, a veteran educator with more than a decade of experience as a school administrator, to serve as interim assistant superintendent, Austin said Thursday.
Austin, 51, is currently the district’s curriculum supervisor for math and science. She started in Hernando [...]
BROOKSVILLE — On the evening of Sept. 17, Barbara L. Price sat down for a light dinner and a couple of 16-ounce beers. After her meal, Price said she had three or four cocktails, the last one around 11 p.m.
This, according to her account of the evening in School District [...]
BROOKSVILLE — The judge is wrong. Fire the teacher who smoked pot.
That’s the recommendation to the Hernando School Board from board attorney Paul Carland for how to handle Michael Provost, the Parrott Middle School health teacher who tested positive for marijuana in March after admitting to off-campus use of the [...]
TAMPA -- Parents, it's time to check students' book bags for some crumpled but important forms.
Permission slips for in-school inoculations against swine flu are going home this week, with vaccinations due to start Monday at some special-needs sites in the Hillsborough County school system. That campaign is due to' [...]
TAMPA -- The Hillsborough County school district is already on the brink of winning a $100 million grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to develop a cutting-edge merit pay and teacher evaluation program.
Now the district has been chosen to join a second study that uses video in [...]
BROOKSVILLE — For those who wondered what ever happened to former school superintendent Wayne Alexander, here’s your epilogue.
Alexander is back in Connecticut with a six-figure salary as director of a secondary school for special-needs students.
The transition from Hernando County apparently was seamless.
The Hartford Board of Education on Sept. 22 appointed [...]
BROOKSVILLE -- For weeks, Hernando School Board member and new Chairman John Sweeney has said he was still on the fence about a bid for a second four-year term.
Sounds like he hopes to be back.
"I intend to run for reelection and will make a formal announcement at the proper time," [...]
TAMPA -- A Hillsborough County School Board subcommittee is recommending a way for seniors to earn one exam exemption this fall.
But semester exams will still happen during the week of January 12, rather than before the holidays, and good attendance won't get you out of them. The proposal is' [...]
BROOKSVILLE -- A veteran Hernando County School Board member who wants to keep her job for another four years now has a second opponent in the 2010 election.
Michael Bainum, a culinary arts teacher at Hernando High School, filed today to run for the District 5 seat held by Sandra Nicholson.
Cynthia [...]
TAMPA -- Hillsborough schools may grow this year after all, despite a projection that the district would see a third straight year of enrollment losses.
The district counted 190,366 students Tuesday, up 438 students compared to the same day last year. If those numbers hold, they'll wipe out the projected official October' [...]
TAMPA -- The headlines certainly sounded scary. Students with swine flu will be wearing surgical masks! In school!
But Hillsborough County school officials said all the media excitement over Monday's arrival of 20,000 surgical masks was short on facts and long on hype.
For the record, district spokeswoman Linda Cobbe said, students with flu symptoms won't' [...]
BROOKSVILLE — Michael Provost wanted school officials to be on his side.
The popular health teacher who led drug education programs at Parrott Middle School admitted earlier this year that he’d made a mistake by using marijuana at home. But he said he deserved another chance and not to be fired, [...]
BROOKSVILLE — The School Board already faced an uphill battle against two ineligible students who had sued to return to Nature Coast Technical High School, an attorney told the board members in a closed-door meeting on Aug. 17.
But on the eve of a hearing before a judge, the members learned [...]
TAMPA -- The state wanted a shakeup at Middleton High last spring, and the Hillsborough County schools delivered.
That's the bottom line in a report approved last week by the School Board and headed to next week's state Board of Education meeting.
While Middleton posted gains last spring on the [...]
BROOKSVILLE – The Hernando School Board threw back the barracuda today.
The board last month had selected the toothy fish as the mascot for the yet-to-be-named high school on U.S. 19 north of Weeki Wachee set to open next fall. But at a workshop this afternoon, board member Sandra Nicholson said she [...]
BROOKSVILLE -- Former Hernando School Board member Jim Malcolm says he is enjoying retirement too much to serve as the district’s interim superintendent.
Malcolm, who had prepared a resume and letter of interest for the post and was slated to go before the School Board on Tuesday [...]
TAMPA -- Need a free tutor in Hillsborough County this fall?
Under the federal No Child Left Behind Act, you might be entitled to one. And it's time to go shopping.
On Saturday at 1 p.m. at Memorial Middle School in Tampa, the school district will be offering the first of five [...]
BROOKSVILLE – It’s official. Hernando County schools superintendent Wayne Alexander will depart Sept. 11.
The School Board voted 4 to 1 with little discussion Thursday morning to approve an agreement setting Alexander’s last day and providing him with 30 days of salary and benefits on that [...]
BROOKSVILLE — Beleaguered Hernando school superintendent Wayne Alexander will leave his post Sept. 11 -- nine months before his contract expires -- if the School Board approves a proposed agreement later this week.
Alexander would receive 30 days of salary and benefits. The exact amount of the payout was unclear on [...]
TAMPA – Did police find any indicators of abuse during their investigation of the King High School assistant principal who squeezed students’ toes for earning poor grades?
The subject came up at last Tuesday’s televised meeting of the Hillsborough County School Board, after several citizens objected to the district’s handling [...]
TAMPA -- Unionized teachers in Hillsborough County have overwhelmingly ratified a tentative contract agreement with the School Board, officials said today.
Some 82 percent of Hillsborough Classroom Teachers' Association members who voted on the contract supported it, while 18 percent opposed it, said executive director Nick Whitman. It was not immediately' [...]
BROOKSVILLE -- A majority of the Hernando School Board now says it's ready to cut ties with superintendent Wayne Alexander.
Chairwoman Dianne Bonfield stunned fellow board members at the conclusion of Tuesday night’s board meeting by seeking support to get Alexander to leave “as soon as possible.”
Though [...]
BROOKSVILLE — Faced with three options on a construction timetable for the new K-8 school north of Weeki Wachee, a divided Hernando School Board picked the middle one Tuesday afternoon.
A majority of the five board members agreed to build the K-5 portion of the school in time to open in fall [...]
TAMPA -- Superintendent MaryEllen Elia earned stellar ratings from most members of the Hillsborough County School Board in her annual performance review.
Four out of seven members awarded her more than 40 points out of a possible 45 on the district's evaluation scale, and two -- Jack Lamb [...]
TAMPA -- Perfect attendance is a wonderful thing, but it likely won't get you out of semester exams this year in Hillsborough County.
District officials today said they would continue the suspension of their attendance incentive program through the 2009-10 school year, in order to prevent the spread of the' [...]
BROOKSVILLE — A former Nature Coast Technical High student, booted out for not living in Hernando County, wants help from a judge to remain at the school.
Sandy Noble has filed a civil suit against the Hernando County School Board on behalf of her daughter, 16-year-old Jennifer Alred.
The complaint lists Alred only [...]
BROOKSVILLE — The Hernando School Board has decided against using its new power to raise the tax rate by 25 cents for every $1,000 of taxable property value.
The board voted 2-2 Tuesday night not to use the option granted them by state lawmakers this year to levy an additional [...]
TAMPA -- Members of the Hillsborough County School Board face a crowded agenda today at their regular 3 p.m. meeting.
On tap is the district's first public hearing on millage rates and tentative budget for the coming school year. Officials say they're facing a $10 million shortfall and may' [...]
BROOKSVILLE - A veteran Hernando County School Board member wants to come back for more.
Sandy Nicholson prefiled for re-election Thursday to return for a fourth four-year term.
Nicholson, a 61-year-old Brooksville resident and a former office manager for her husband’s engineering firm, said she had “no doubts” [...]
TAMPA -- Don't look for new school construction projects anytime soon in Hillsborough County.
Enrollment is projected to drop again this fall from last year's 189,800, itself a four-year low, district officials said at a School Board workshop Tuesday.
And the five schools opening this August will be the last new' [...]
