The Laker/Lutz News

Serving Pasco since 1981/Serving Lutz since 1964

West Zephyrhills Elementary School

Zephyrhills sets tentative millage rate

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Zephyrhills property owners won’t see an increase in their ad valorem tax rate for fiscal year 2020-2021.

The Zephyrhills City Council on July 27 unanimously voted to set the tentative millage rate at 6.35 mills — a rate the municipality has maintained for several years.

Public hearings on the proposed property tax rate have been scheduled for Sept. 14 and Sept. 28.

Under state law, once a tentative millage rate has been set, the city cannot raise it before the start of the fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1. The council does, however, have the option to reduce the rate before then.

A mill represents $1 in tax for every $1,000 worth of a property’s taxable assessed value.

In Zephyrhills, maintaining a rate of 6.35 mills would levy about $5.32 million in property taxes — a revenue increase of nearly $380,000 compared with last year.

The figures are based on the total city’s property value of nearly $838 million, an increase of $63.8 million over last year. Of that increase, $28.7 million is attributable to new construction.

The city’s tentative budget is typically set by Aug. 1 each year. However, staff requested to delay the deadline until Aug. 7, because the city is awaiting various revenue estimates from the state.

In other news, council members received an update on the Sarah Vande Berg Foundation’s outreach plans, in the midst of COVID-19.

The Sarah Vande Berg Tennis & Wellness Center, at 6585 Simons Road, won’t open its doors until mid- or late September, but inroads are being made to grow the sport among local youth.

The outreach will be done through the Sarah Vande Berg Foundation, a nonprofit that subsidizes tennis equipment, lessons and afterschool programs to underserved community youth, in partnership with the forthcoming tennis facility.

Nick Walton, the foundation’s program director, explained that the foundation had partnered with West Zephyrhills Elementary School to offer an afterschool tennis program in the spring, but that the program had to be postponed until the fall because of the pandemic.

In addition to partnering with individual schools, including West Zephyrhills Elementary, Walton said the nonprofit also will host a series of free afterschool programs available to all youth in the community during the 2020-2021 school year — regardless of whether students attend brick-and-mortar schools or take virtual classes.

The afterschool program likely will be held around 3:30 p.m. or 4 p.m., on weekdays, Walton said.

“We’ve secured enough funding right now to secure us through the entire school year, so you guys will be seeing me, hopefully trying to raise more, and get into more schools and have more programs running,” Walton told the council.

The nearly $5 million tennis complex features 11 regulation outdoor tennis courts, eight pickleball courts and four padel courts, as well as a state-of-the art indoor health and wellness center, among other amenities.

The facility is a public-private partnership between the City of Zephyrhills and Pascal Collard, a longtime tennis pro and instructor serving as the facility’s CEO.

Virtual meetings set for audio upgrades
In the last several weeks, Zephyrhills city government meetings have mostly returned in-person amid COVID-19, but citizens still have the opportunity to listen and participate through a telephone call-in number.

The Zephyrhills City Hall council chambers is being outfitted with a new computer system to enhance audio quality for broadcasting virtual meetings. (File)

As staffers and council members have begun conducting semi-virtual meetings at the City Hall council chambers, some audio quality issues have arisen for those who listen in on the phone in real time.

That’s because the chamber room’s communications system wasn’t originally designed to accommodate in-person meetings that could also be broadcasted remotely.

Zephyrhills City Manager Billy Poe said those issues should be sorted out in time for the next scheduled council meeting on Aug. 10, as the city’s IT department is working to retrofit a new computer system that will provide for better sound processing.

“We’ve heard complaints about people being able to only hear every third word or being muffled,” Poe said. “Hopefully, we’ll have something in place, and hopefully it’ll work for the next meeting.”

With that, council president Charles Proctor expressed his appreciation for Mike Panak, the  city’s IT director, for helping set up a virtual meeting system on the fly, over the course of the shutdown.

“I’m sure this has been difficult for him to run all of this, and get all this, and I’m sure this has been a nightmare for him, and I really appreciate the fine job done, especially when we were meeting virtually,” Proctor said.

The council president also thanked the city’s entire staff for its dedication and its work to keep the municipality running over the last several months.

“This has been one of the most difficult times in our country’s history, and we have such an amazing group of employees that are so faithful. They show up to work, do an amazing job, even through all this nightmare that we’ve all been living.

“From the guy on the back of the truck to our police and city manager, I’m just so thankful that we have such an amazing team,” Proctor said.

Published August 05, 2020

Zephyrhills Police chief talks crime, initiatives and more

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Arrests are up in Zephyrhills, but overall crime trends are down citywide.

That’s according to Zephyrhills Police Department Chief Derek Brewer, who was the featured guest speaker at the Greater Zephyrhills Chamber of Commerce July breakfast meeting.

Brewer said arrests in Zephyrhills have increased each of the last three years, topping out at 1,077 in 2018.

Zephyrhills Police Department Chief Derek was the featured guest speaker at the Greater Zephyrhills Chamber of Commerce July breakfast meeting. (Kevin Weiss)

That’s up from 1,047 arrests in 2017 and 942 in 2016, respectively.

Many of the agency’s arrests are related to narcotics and property crimes, Brewer said, noting those crimes “go hand in hand” and are where a majority of the problems are in the city.

There were 288 narcotics arrests and 268 property crimes arrests in 2018 alone.

Brewer explained many of those arrests have been initiated by the department’s street crimes unit — a special response team tasked with “attacking some of the problems in the city” on a daily basis, whether its traffic complaints, narcotics, burglaries, thefts and so on.

“A lot of our attention has been on narcotics and property crimes. If we can attack the narcotics problem, a lot of times property crimes will be reduced,” said Brewer, an 18-year veteran of the department who’s served as chief for about two years.

Brewer stated an added emphasis on narcotics and property crimes has led to a reduction in Zephyrhills’ overall crime rate (total number of crimes of offenses reported) in each of the past four years. The city experienced its biggest crime rate reduction of 19.2 percent last year, he said.

“Our crime trends are continuing to go down, our strategy seems to be working,” Brewer said.

“I know people will see certain individuals in town and will say, ‘Boy, we still have a drug problem,’ but I’m telling you we’re attacking it, and it is making a difference in our crime reduction.”

Aside from crime prevention and reduction efforts, Brewer highlighted some ongoing initiatives within the police department.

For instance, the agency recently implemented a citizen volunteer crossing guard program at West Zephyrhills Elementary School, with plans to expand it to Woodland Elementary School in the near future. The department is looking for more volunteers, who will be trained and then deployed at local schools.

So far, the crossing guard program has gotten “amazing feedback” from the West Zephyrhills Elementary community, Brewer said.

“We have noticed since we put the crossing guard program in West (Zephyrhills Elementary), people are slowing down a lot more, and we certainly feel better about providing more safety for the kids,” he added.

Brewer emphasized that the department has heightened its community involvement efforts, particularly in terms of youth outreach programs.

One such initiative, called “Operation Chill,” involves police officers giving children a Slurpee drink coupon when seen in public “doing the right thing.”

Officers also are involved in Big Brothers Big Sisters “Bigs in Blue” mentorship program, where they spend one-to-one time mentoring a child at a neighborhood school.

“We’re in front of our youth frequently,” Brewer said. The agency’s goal is to be “highly visible” and “make the community pro-police and the police to be pro-community.”

The chief also discussed the impact of body cameras, since the agency required all officers to wear them about a year ago.

The Axon Body 2 cameras are installed on all Zephyrhills police officers and patrol cars. They activate automatically whenever an officer’s taser or firearm is deployed.

Brewer said the body camera program has been “incredibly helpful” for evidence collection, and also for dismissing frivolous citizen complaints against officers.

“In my opinion, it’s been a great program,” Brewer said. “I know that some people are against the body cameras, including officers, but I think even the officers that were against it, they’re starting to come around because they’re seeing that these complaints are getting squashed pretty quickly.”

The department also is exploring the possibility of police academy training sponsorships to attract more police officers. The department currently has 34 sworn police officers and 16 civilian employees.

There has been turnover in recent years, Brewer acknowledged. It also is becoming increasingly difficult to find qualified officers and people interested in law enforcement careers, he said.

“I just don’t think people want to be police officers anymore, just because of all the stuff that comes with it,” Brewer said.

Published July 17, 2019

She knows local history, and is preserving it

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If you want to learn a thing or two about local history — particularly as it pertains to Wesley Chapel, Dade City and Zephyrhills — a telephone call to Madonna Jervis Wise will put you on the right track.

Madonna Jervis Wise has written several books, including four which help preserve the history of Zephyrhills, Dade City and Wesley Chapel. (B.C. Manion)

Wise has written books about all three communities.

“I’ve always been interested in history,” she said. “We’re sitting in my dining room, and these are some of my family heirlooms that came on a covered wagon from Pennsylvania,” the retired educator said, during an interview in the Zephyrhills home she shares with her husband, Ernie.

Her interest in the history of people, places and things began early.

As a little girl, she would go with her father, who was a farmer in Indiana, as he went out to plow fields.

As he worked, he would have her wait in the home where he was plowing.

“One of those people that I remember, when I was about 6 or 7, was Mrs. Hefley. And, I remember her showing me the crochet work and the tatting work. She would begin to tell me about the family and the experiences they had. I just always made those connections.”

She also recalls spending an enormous amount of time with her grandparents.

“My grandfather was a blacksmith during World War I,” said Wise, who began her career in education as a history teacher.

Dade City women organized the Alpha Sorosis Club, which met regularly for intellectual pursuits. The club was founded in 1909, and continued through 1968. (File)

She’s always been a writer, for as long as she can remember and, wherever she’s worked, people have turned to her to do newsletters and other writing chores.

Her foray into authoring local history books began while she was working as the principal at West Zephyrhills Elementary School and she began compiling information about the community of Zephyrhills.

“I just started researching it,” she said. “I would get more and more stuff. I was like, ‘This has to be preserved.’ That’s kind of how it happened.”

To capture that history, she self-published a book called “Zephyrhills – An Anthology of its History Through Education.”

The book was a family affair. Her husband and daughter, Mamie, edited the volume.

Downtown Dade City, during the 1940s, was a thriving hub of activity.

Around the same time, she published a book called “Juanita in Blue,” a four-year project showcasing her mother’s recipes.

“My mother was an extraordinary cook. She ran this little restaurant in Indiana. It was called The Rainbow Café.

“After she passed away, I had all these boxes of recipe cards,” Wise said.

So, she created cookbooks for each of her three kids: Jervis, an attorney in St. Petersburg; Mamie, an attorney in Tampa; and Rachel, who is studying to become an attorney, in Gulfport.

The three community history books that Wise has written are part of Arcadia Publishing’s Images of America series.

The publisher, which has now merged with History Press, invited Wise to do a local history book about Zephyrhills. After that, the publisher invited her to do books on Dade City and Wesley Chapel.

Before accepting the offer to do the Dade City book, Wise said she cleared the idea with various groups from the Dade City community because she didn’t want to be presumptuous or intrusive.

Any concerns along those lines were alleviated by Dade City folks who not only encouraged her to pursue the local history book, but helped her in tracking down the documents and photographs that she needed to tell the community’s story.

“It really came together,” Wise said.

Pasco Packing was the home of the largest citrus processing company in the world, when citrus was in its heyday in Florida.

Next, she tackled the task of compiling Wesley Chapel’s history.

Figuring out how to approach that took some thought, she said, because unlike Zephyrhills and Dade City — which are municipalities with city records — Wesley Chapel is unincorporated.

So, she turned to genealogy skills to help track down the families who have shaped the community’s history.

Initially, she thought the book would focus primarily on ranching, and would include some ranching artifacts.

But then, she went into some genealogy sites and plugged in some key names, which led to interviews with families.

One interview led to another, and the story of Wesley Chapel emerged.

A desire “to preserve the stories” motivates her to do the research, conduct the interviews, gather the photographs, track other documents and compile the local history books, she said.

Wise said she enjoyed digging into the history of residents who settled in Pasco County, adding they remind her of the people in Patrick Smith’s book, “The Land Remembered.”

“It’s a young history, relatively speaking,” Wise said. It’s an area where “rugged people cleared the land and settled and persevered. I’ve always been drawn to those stories.

“I become really enamored with the people,” Wise added. “That was a hard life. The mosquito-ridden frontier of Florida — no air conditioning.

“It was something else,” she said.

Published September 20, 2017

Changes afoot, as school bells ring in a new year

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School bells are summoning students back to classes in Hillsborough and Pasco counties — and some students will be attending classes on entirely new campuses.

Sunlake Academy of Math and Science, a new public charter school in Hillsborough County, begins its inaugural school year on Aug. 10. It is located at 18681 N. Dale Mabry Highway in Lutz.

Sunlake Academy of Math and Science, at 18681 N. Dale Mabry Highway, is opening this year as a new public charter school in Hillsborough County. The school, located in Lutz, will serve elementary and middle school students. (B.C. Manion)

Meanwhile, Pasco County is opening Bexley Elementary, at 4380 Ballantrae Blvd., in Land O’ Lakes, and Cypress Creek Middle High School, in Wesley Chapel.

Students arriving at Land O’ Lakes High School will find reconfigured spaces, to accommodate a $29 million makeover.

At Sunlake High School and Rushe Middle School, there will be a new traffic pattern for student drop-off and pickups, and at Wiregrass Ranch High, the school will be back to operating on a seven-period day.

Those are just a few of the changes in store for the new school year, which begins in Hillsborough County on Aug. 10 and in Pasco County on Aug. 14.

Some changes, which are state mandates, affect public school students in both counties.

Other changes affect students at a particular school or within a specific county.

For instance, the Pasco school district is revising its crisis plans to give students and staff a better chance to survive an active threat on campus.

Meanwhile, Principal Vicki Wolin will lead the new Bexley Elementary School, in the Bexley subdivision off State Road 54, in Land O’ Lakes. That school was built to ease crowding at Oakstead and Odessa elementary schools.

Bexley is also part of the school district’s feeder pattern for the Aviation Academy at Sunlake High School.

As such, Bexley will have drones, flight simulators and robotics. Its STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) lab is situated in its media center, which it calls its REC Center, which stands for Research, Engage and Collaborate.

Cypress Creek Middle High School, at 8701 Old Pasco Road in Wesley Chapel, will serve students previously assigned to Wiregrass Ranch, Wesley Chapel and Sunlake high schools and John Long, Weightman and Rushe middle schools.

Principal Carin Hetzler-Nettles, previously principal at Wesley Chapel High, will recognize many of the students streaming onto the campus for their first day.

But, there will be many unfamiliar faces, too.

The school has been hosting events ahead of opening day to help students get acquainted with the school and to find out what it has to offer.

Cypress Creek Middle High will serve sixth- through 11th-graders its initial year and will add a senior class its second year.

The new high school’s curriculum runs the gamut from ballet to digital design to American Sign Language. It offers several certification programs, including Microsoft Office, QuickBooks and Autodesk Inventor.

Cypress Creek’s middle school curriculum includes Criminal Justice and Engineering academies, plus core classes.

The new schools aren’t the only places where Pasco County students will have a chance for new experiences.

The district also is expanding its Cambridge Programme to San Antonio Elementary School.

And, Zephyrhills High School is adding a new academy of Building Construction Technology and Public Safety Telecommunications 911 certification for the Academy of Criminal Justice.

A new public charter school also has opened in Pasco County, too, bringing the district’s total number of charter schools to 11. The new charter is called Pasco MYcroSchool and is located in New Port Richey.

Besides new schools and programs, Pasco County also has shifted some principals since last school year and promoted an assistant principal to the top post.

Those changes are:

  • Principal Scott Atkins has moved from Sand Pine Elementary School to West Zephyrhills Elementary School.
  • Christine Twardosz has transferred from Centennial Elementary School to Sand Pine.
  • Gretchen Rudolph Fladd has moved from Veterans to Centennial.
  • Melissa Bidgood, who was an assistant principal at Watergrass Elementary, has been promoted to the principal’s post at Veterans.

Parents wanting to know more about the upcoming school year should check out their school’s website.

School websites can provide a wealth of information. They generally list important upcoming dates for school activities, such as cheerleader tryouts, booster club meetings, school spirit nights and parent-teacher events.

The websites also often let parents know how they can get involved at school and how they can help their children at home.

Most schools also have Facebook pages and Twitter accounts, and some post videos to YouTube, too.

Websites maintained by the Hillsborough and Pasco school districts can also provide useful information, too.

Free breakfasts
Pasco County Schools will serve free breakfasts to all students at these sites in The Laker/Lutz News coverage area during the 2017-2018 school year:

Elementary schools

  • Centennial Elementary
  • Chester Taylor Elementary
  • Lacoochee Elementary
  • Pasco Elementary
  • Quail Hollow Elementary
  • Rodney B. Cox Elementary
  • West Zephyrhills Elementary
  • Woodland Elementary

Middle schools:

  • Centennial Middle
  • Pasco Middle
  • Stewart Middle

High schools:

  • Pasco High
  • Zephyrhills High

 

Meal prices for Pasco County Schools
Reduced-price meals

Reduced-price breakfast: .30
Reduced-price lunch: .40
Full-price meals
Full-price breakfast
Elementary: $1.35
Secondary: $1.50
Charter, K-8: $1.50
Charter, high school: $1.60
Full-price lunch
Elementary: $2.50
Middle: $3
High: $3.25

Published August 9, 2017

Free breakfast for all at nearly 50 schools

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Free breakfast is now available to all students in nearly 50 schools in Pasco County for the 2014-15 school year.

Reduced and free meals are typically available to lower income families. However, these schools have 60 percent or more of their students eligible for free or reduced price meals and also are part of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Provision 2, according to Julie Hedine, director of food and nutrition services.

The schools now offering free breakfast for all students include:

• Anclote Elementary School
• Anclote High School
• Athenian Academy
• Baycare Behavioral Health
• Bayonet Point Middle School
• Calusa Elementary School
• Centennial Elementary School
• Centennial Middle School
• Chasco Middle School
• Cotee River Elementary School
• Crews Lake Middle School
• Fivay High School
• Fox Hollow Elementary School
• Giella Elementary School
• Gulf Highlands Elementary School
• Gulf High School
• Gulf Middle School
• Gulf Trace Elementary School
• Gulfside Elementary School
• Hudson Elementary School
• Hudson Middle School
• Hudson High School
• Irvin Education Center
• Lacoochee Elementary School
• Locke Elementary School
• Marchman Technical Education Center
• Marlowe Elementary School
• Moon Lake Elementary School
• Moore Mickens Education Center
• Northwest Elementary School
• Pasco Middle School
• Pasco High School
• Richey Elementary School
• Ridgewood High School
• San Antonio Elementary School
• Schrader Elementary School
• Schwettman Education Center
• Seven Springs Elementary School
• Smith Middle School
• Stewart Middle School
• Sunray Elementary School
• Taylor Elementary School
• West Zephyrhills Elementary School
• Woodland Elementary School
• Zephyrhills High School

For more information on the program, call Julie Hedine at (813) 794-2439, or email her at .

As a new school year begins, be sure kids can hear teachers

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A child’s hearing difficulties are not always easy to spot.

That’s why volunteers like Alice Jones of Zephyrhills can play such an important role in a child’s life.

Alice Jones, of Zephyrhills, recently was honored for her volunteer work for the Sertoma Speech & Hearing Foundation of Florida. She conducts hearing tests at various Pasco County schools, to help detect hearing loss in children. (B.C. Manion/Staff Photo)
Alice Jones, of Zephyrhills, recently was honored for her volunteer work for the Sertoma Speech & Hearing Foundation of Florida. She conducts hearing tests at various Pasco County schools, to help detect hearing loss in children.
(B.C. Manion/Staff Photo)

Jones — recently named Sertoma Speech & Hearing Foundation of Florida’s volunteer of the month — has spent the past several years traveling to various Pasco County schools to conduct hearing tests for children.

The 76-year-old goes to schools within roughly a 20-mile radius of her home, sitting with children who are wearing earphones, and asking them if they can hear the sounds coming through the wires. When they can’t, Sertoma lets the school know, so they can inform the child’s parent.

Most of the time the youngsters can hear. But when they can’t, there are places where they can plug in for help, said Barbra Antonelli, an audiologist at the New Port Richey site for All Children’s Outpatient Care Center of Pasco.

Children can be born with hearing loss or it sometimes develops as they grow older, said Judith Reese, an audiologist at JC Audiology in Lutz. Federal law requires screening of infants. That typically occurs before the baby leaves the hospital, or during a follow-up visit soon after.

Some Pasco County public schools have staff members who conduct hearing screenings, but others use volunteers to do the checks. Sertoma volunteers, like Jones, conduct hearing tests for kindergarten, first- and sixth-graders in Pasco County public schools.

The organization always is looking for more help, Jones added. She got involved because a member of the Zephyrhills Noon Rotary Club asked members to volunteer.

Schools where Jones has helped out over the years include Connerton Elementary School in Land O’ Lakes, Veterans Elementary School in Wesley Chapel, West Zephyrhills Elementary and Stewart Middle schools in Zephyrhills, and Pasco Elementary and Pasco Middle schools in Dade City.

There are various causes of hearing loss, Reese said.

“One of the things that happens most often in children is a temporary hearing loss that is due to ear infections or even a build up of fluid in the ear,” Reese said. “Those are easily treated by medical professionals.”

Early detection is important.

“We really like to catch them early because you can have significant delays in speech and language, even if somebody has an ear infection for just a few months,” Reese said. “When they’re developing their speech and language, it can have a big impact on the child.”

Infants who are not startled by loud sounds may have a hearing loss, Antonelli said. If they don’t respond to their name or a dog barking, that may also be another sign.

Sometimes the problem is not obvious, Reese said.

Typically, if a child has an ear infection, parents become aware of it because it hurts.

“So, they’re crying or their ears are real red,” Reese said. “But if it’s just a build up of fluid, they may kind of just disengage, or tug at their ear.”

But sometimes fluid inside the ear doesn’t hurt, but is hindering a child’s hearing. In a case like that, a parent may think that their child is refusing to behave, or lagging behind in school because they’re not trying, Reese said. In fact, it may be that the child didn’t hear his parents or teacher, or didn’t hear them accurately.

It’s not just a matter of hearing sound, Reese explained. It’s also a matter of processing it properly.

Some signs that children may have a hearing loss include errors in articulation, Antonelli said. It also may seem that children don’t listen well or have trouble following directions. Or, they may want the volume on the television turned up.

When children don’t get help, they can experience academic and social difficulties.

If the hearing loss is spotted early, though, those problems can be avoided. Even newborns can be fitted with hearing aids, Antonelli said.

“Basically, they’ll never fall behind,” she said.

For more information, call Sertoma at (727) 834-5479, or visit FamilyHearingHelp.org.

Hearing loss symptoms and getting help

Hearing loss can happen when any part of the ear is not working properly, including the outer ear, middle ear, inner ear, acoustic nerve and auditory system, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The losses can vary greatly and can be due to a number of causes, the CDC says.

Here are some facts from the CDC to help you learn more about symptoms of hearing loss and what to do when they appear.

Signs in babies
• They do not startle at loud noises
• They do not turn to the source of a sound after 6 months of age
• They do not say single words, such as “dada” or “mama” by 1 year of age
• They turn their heads when they see you, but not if you just call their name
• They seem to hear some sounds but not others

Signs in Children
• Speech is delayed
• Speech is not clear
• They do not follow directions
• They often say, “Huh?”
• They turn the television up too high

The signs and symptoms of hearing loss are different for each child. If you think that a child might have hearing loss, ask the child’s doctor for a hearing screening as soon as possible.

Published August 13, 2014

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Pasco schools get good news in reading, science

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Florida schools are transitioning into the Next Generation Sunshine State Standards, and some proof of the success of that move already is showing up in the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test scores.

Pasco County schools showed improvement in reading and science, but has room for improvement when it comes to math, based on test details released by Pasco County Schools on Friday.

“We are seeing that what we are doing is starting to pay off,” said Vanessa Hilton, director of teaching and learning with the school district, in a release. “We are starting to see strengths in the cohorts of students who have been receiving instruction based on the new Florida Standards as they progress from grade to grade.”

Several schools demonstrated significant improvement on the FCAT 2.0 Reading sections in 2014 compared to the year before. The biggest increases came from local elementary schools like Taylor, Pasco, Cox, New River, West Zephyrhills and Watergrass. They also improved with seventh graders at Academy at the Farm, and underclassmen at Pasco eSchool and Wesley Chapel High School.

For science, 52 percent of students in fifth grade were performing at or above satisfactory scores, while 52 percent of students in eighth grade had similar results. This is up 49 percent from the previous year in fifth grade, and 48 percent in eighth grade.

A little more than 25 elementary schools in the county maintained or increased the percent of students scoring at or above satisfactory levels, joined by 11 middle schools. Odessa, Pasco, Seven Oaks and Watergrass elementary schools were some of the local schools that had significant improvement in science, along with Pasco and Stewart middle schools.

The picture wasn’t so rosy when it came to math, however. The percentage of elementary school students in Pasco scoring at satisfactory levels was below the statewide percentage. However, some schools had some marked improvement in math, including Centennial, Odessa, Cox, New River, San Antonio, Taylor, Watergrass and West Zephyrhills elementary schools. Pasco and Long middle schools also had strong improvement in math, as did Academy at the Farm.

“This was a year of transition, and we know that our teachers have been focusing on the new Florida Standards in the classroom,” Pasco superintendent Kurt Browning said, in a release. “It will be important for us to consider not only these scores, but also additional data that our schools have been collecting to make decisions as we move forward.”