BROWARD COUNTY, Fla. – Broward Schools Superintendent Peter Licata spoke about closing or repurposing schools as the process got underway Thursday.
Fort Lauderdale High School will be the host of one of three town hall meetings. The second will be at J.P. Taravella High on Feb. 15, and the third will be the following Thursday, Feb. 22, at Charles W. Flanagan High.
“It’s going to start with the people,” said Licata. “We need you out there, we need to hear from the people. This affects them.”
Repurposing or closing schools is mainly driven by under-enrollment as public schools now compete with charter schools, private schools and the new voucher program, where the state even pays for private education.
“As I’ve been saying to a lot of people, we’ve got to stop paying for the things we don’t have, the students we don’t have and start paying for the students we do have,” said Licata.
In Broward County, 67 of 239 schools have enrollment below 70% capacity.
The three schools with the lowest enrollment are Pines Middle School with an enrollment of 34.5%, Broward Estates Elementary with an enrollment of 35.7% and Thurgood Marshall Elementary with 43%.
“Not everyone is going to be happy. It’s hard,” said Licata. “These are neighborhood icons. These are historical buildings that we have to be very careful about.”
The president of the teachers union in Broward County expressed concern about how and where teachers and students get relocated, and if this will address an issue from the past that seems to be plaguing schools, which is class size.
“What they’ve done has over-sized our class sizes,” said Broward Teachers Union President Anna Fusco. “Kindergarten through third grade should be 18 students. I’ve got classrooms sitting with 22, 24 students.”