Mater Academy Inc., a Miami-based charter school operator, has submitted notices to occupy three Sarasota County public school campuses, marking a sharp local escalation of the state’s newly expanded “Schools of Hope” law, which allows charters to take over public school facilities.
The notices, submitted early Wednesday, target Brookside Middle, Emma E. Booker Elementary and Oak Park School, a K-12 campus that serves students with disabilities. They are among similar notices sent to school districts statewide this week, according to Sarasota County Schools officials.
“We have significant concerns about the impact these proposals would have on students, staff, and programs currently in place at these schools,” said Sarasota County Schools Superintendent Terry Connor in a statement to Suncoast Searchlight. “These are established district-operated campuses that serve important roles in their communities.”
The district has 20 calendar days to submit objections to the proposals on grounds of “material impracticability,” according to a Florida Department of Education rule that was amended on Sept. 24.
However, Sarasota Schools officials said the filings are premature – pointing to the fact that the Department of Education’s rule has not yet gone into effect. According to the district, the charter operator must wait until Nov. 11 to submit a notice.
A request for comment at the number provided in the charter school operator’s notice was not immediately returned.
Mater Academy, a non-profit charter founded in 1998, is linked to Academica, a major for-profit charter management company that works with more than 200 charter schools around the country, according to Academica’s website.
Mater Academy’s advances come just weeks after Sarasota County Schools proposed closing Wilkinson Elementary, hoping that by moving its students to three other campuses — Alta Vista, Brentwood and Gulf Gate Elementary — it would boost enrollment at those schools and stave off potential charter takeovers. That plan, which sparked outrage among Wilkinson parents, is still under consideration.
“I had a feeling it was coming, but I didn’t think it would be today,” said Robyn Marinelli, chair of the board of Sarasota County Schools, of the Mater Academy notices.
Under the Schools of Hope law, school districts must pay for charter school expenses associated with the maintenance and operations of the schools, including custodial work, nursing, food services and student transportation.
“We’ve got beautiful facilities. We have a very engaged community with our school systems, we have a referendum. We have a beautiful place where we live,” said Marinelli. “Who wouldn’t want to take over our schools?”
School board member Liz Barker said she had heard from officials across Florida who indicated that they had received similar notices.
“It’s a hostile takeover,” Barker said.
Plans would remake three campuses
Previous versions of the law targeted only under-performing schools, but the new version, signed in June by Gov. Ron DeSantis, opens the door for charter schools to occupy space at any public school with enough room to accommodate them.
In three nearly identical two-page notices, the charter school company laid out plans for the takeovers, each of which would start in August 2027:
At Oak Park, Mater Academy would offer classes from kindergarten through 12th grade using “up to available capacity” the first year, with plans to grow its enrollment to 467 students in five years. The district-run school enrolled just 211 students last year — a 37% drop since 2013, according to a Suncoast Searchlight analysis of state data.
At Booker, a historically Black elementary school, Mater would serve K-5 students, also using “up to available capacity” the first year but grow to 548 students in five years. The school, which Mater’s filing misspelled as “Brooker,” enrolled 451 students last year — down 13% over the past decade.
At Brookside, Mater proposes bringing elementary grades onto the middle school campus, creating a K-8 program with enrollment projected to reach 805 students in five years. Brookside currently serves 724 students, an 11% decline since 2013.
These schools are among more than 20 public institutions in Sarasota County that lost student enrollment during this time, including 15 schools that saw enrollment drop by at least 10% since the 2013-14 school year, the earliest data available from the Florida Department of Education.
The district could suggest alternative facilities, but the state law does not require the charter school applying for space to defer to the district’s preferences.
“There is no reason for charter operators outside our community to come here except for them to take advantage of our tax base and taxpayers,” said Holly Bullard, chief strategy and development officer with the Florida Policy Institute, who has a child at Wilkinson. “No one asked the parents of these schools and communities if they would want a squatter school to set up shop in their school.”
“They come in rent-free”
News that Mater plans to take over school district facilities jolted Sarasota’s education community, igniting anger among parents and officials who have invested in the school system.
“Everything is on Sarasota’s dime and they come in rent free,” said Tom Edwards, a school board member. “I want to rally all of Sarasota and say Tallahassee is out of line. We need to get the entire school district fired up.”
Edwards said he met with State Rep. Fiona McFarland, R-Sarasota, last week to discuss the possibility of her pushing for a one-year grace period from the law — time he said would have allowed the district to roll out a multi-part plan to address underused schools.
McFarland said she would try, Edwards recalled, but that there wasn’t “appetite” in Tallahassee for any effort to delay or challenge the new law.
McFarland did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment Wednesday.
Carol Lerner, a retired public educator and director of Support Our Schools, a Florida-based nonprofit advocating for public schools, called the news the “worst-case scenario.”
“This is my nightmare,” Lerner said. “Look at who they’re going after — the historically Black community and kids with severe disabilities.”
Trevor Harvey, president of the NAACP Sarasota chapter, called Booker a “pillar elementary school” and said he believes the district will find a way to stave off a charter school from coming in to fill empty seats. He says the district needs to get creative and think outside the box.
Allie Martin, a parent of a third grader at Wilkinson Elementary who has rallied to prevent the closure of that school, said the news is “hitting me really hard.”
Now, she said, she faces a similar fight at Brookside Middle, where her daughter is in sixth grade.
“It’s just hard to believe this is all happening so quickly. It’s scary,” Martin said.
“Here we go. Round two, I guess.”
Alice Herman and Derek Gilliam are investigative/watchdog reporters and Josh Salman is the senior investigative reporter/deputy editor at Suncoast Searchlight. Reach out to Alice at at alice@suncoastsearchlight.org; reach out to Derek at derek@suncoastsearchlight.org; reach out to Josh at josh@suncoastsearchlight.org.
This story was originally published by Suncoast Searchlight, a nonprofit newsroom delivering investigative journalism to Sarasota, Manatee, and DeSoto counties. Learn more at suncoastsearchlight.org.
