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LARGO, Fla. – Facing a decade-long decline in student enrollment, the Pinellas County<\/a> School Board is preparing for a new round of school<\/a> closure and consolidation recommendations.<\/p>\n Pinellas County School Board members say closing and consolidating schools are tough decisions, but declining enrollment is making it necessary.<\/p>\n “Throughout the state, a decline in birth rate is a topic of discussion for many districts because student enrollment is how districts receive funds,” Caprice Edmond, chairperson of Pinellas County School Board, said.<\/p>\n The backstory:<\/p>\n In February, the school board approved closing Disston Academy and Cross Bayou Elementary at the end of this school year, combining Bay Point Elementary and Middle into a K-8 school in the 2027-2028 school year, and expanding Oldsmar Elementary into a K-8 starting this fall.<\/p>\n They looked at schools\u2019 enrollment numbers, and improvements a building may need to make their decisions.\u00a0<\/p>\n District staff say they\u2019ve been analyzing data for the past few years. Just 68% were enrolled in kindergarten this past school year compared to 87% 10 years ago.<\/p>\n Pinellas County Schools Superintendent Kevin Hendrick signaled to the board earlier this year that more recommendations for closures will be presented to the board this fall.\u00a0<\/p>\n Tuesday, he talked about the next round of recommendations, and the community meetings they\u2019re scheduling for the summer.\u00a0<\/p>\n Dig deeper:<\/p>\n Edmond attributed the trend to a variety of factors, including lower birth rates across Florida <\/a>and the country, and the rising cost of living.\u00a0<\/p>\n Edmond also noted that immigration policies and recent state legislation have impacted the livelihoods and choices of local families.<\/p>\n The board held a workshop Tuesday and discussed the next steps for the decisions already made, and the ones on the horizon.\u00a0<\/p>\n “One of the things that they intentionally mentioned was the staff and student support available as well as the transitions and documentation of that timeline that is occurring, from having project managers and a cohesive team, making sure that each step along the way of this transition, that the schools and families are supported,” Edmond said.\u00a0<\/p>\n What they’re saying:<\/p>\n “This summer what we want to do is go specifically to geographic regions with more refined data about that geographic region,” Hendrick said. “So, for example, north of Curlew Road, think of Palm Harbor, Tarpon Springs, and say, this is how many elementary school students are in these zones. These are how many schools we have. This is how many we have in middle schools. This is what we have. We already have the feedback about what people like, thriving schools, K-8s, all those types of conversations. Now present that and ask this one community, \u2018What are your ideas for this community based on this data set?\u2019 And do that regionally around the district.”<\/p>\n “The intent is to hear from the community, from those regional components or regional demographics, based on what they would like to see if there was a closure or if there was an impact, what they value in those segments of the community,” Edmond said. “Then use that to drive or further the discussion just similar to what they did before where the schools that were impacted, they had meetings there at the school site. This is not something that the board takes lightly.”\u00a0<\/p>\n By the numbers:<\/p>\n While the initial round of changes is projected to save nearly $8 million annually, the next round is expected to have an even larger economic impact.\u00a0<\/p>\n School board officials emphasized that no jobs will be lost as a result of the closures and consolidations.<\/p>\n What you can do:<\/p>\n Edmond encouraged parents and residents to remain engaged as the summer meetings approach.\u00a0<\/p>\n “Email the board. Contact schools that may be impacted. See how they can help or support, and continue to ask questions. What other ways can the district look at the budget? Are these the only options,” Edmond \u00a0said.<\/p>\n What’s next:<\/p>\n The dates for the five meetings haven\u2019t been set yet.\u00a0<\/p>\n Two will be held in south county and the others will be throughout Pinellas.<\/p>\n The Source: Information in this story was gathered from interviews with the Pinellas County School Board.<\/p>\n Pinellas County<\/a>Education<\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LARGO, Fla. – Facing a decade-long decline in student enrollment, the Pinellas County School Board is preparing for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":247370,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[113,47,115,1157,202,204,203,199,201,200,628],"class_list":{"0":"post-247369","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-st-petersburg","8":"tag-education","9":"tag-fl","10":"tag-news","11":"tag-pinellas","12":"tag-st-pete","13":"tag-st-pete-headlines","14":"tag-st-pete-news","15":"tag-st-petersburg","16":"tag-st-petersburg-headlines","17":"tag-st-petersburg-news","18":"tag-us"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/247369","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=247369"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/247369\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/247370"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=247369"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=247369"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=247369"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/vlcsnap-2026-04-24-18h33m51s865.jpg\")
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