JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Four years ago, Phil and Cathy Watson were distressed and desperate. Their daughter Mikayla, then 12, was born with a rare genetic condition that led to physical and cognitive delays. With her school situation getting worse by the day, they needed options, now. 

The Watsons were open to private schools. But they couldn’t find a single one near their home in metro D.C. that met Mikayla’s needs. They even looked in neighboring states. Nothing. 

One day, though, Phil varied his keyword search slightly, and something new popped up: 

A school for students with special needs that had low student-to-staff ratios, transition programs to help students live independently, even an equine therapy program.  

The Watsons feared it was too good to be true. Even if it wasn’t, it was 700 miles away. 

A destination for education    

Florida has always been a magnet for transplants. It’s tough to beat sunshine, low taxes, and hundreds of miles of beach. But as Florida has cemented its reputation as the national leader in school choice, the ability to have exactly the school you want for your kids is making Florida a destination, too. 

In South Florida, Jewish families are flocking from states like New York to a Jewish schools sector that has nearly doubled in 15 years. But they’re not alone. Families of students with special needs are making a beeline for specialized schools, too. The one the Watsons stumbled on has 24 students whose families moved from other states – about 10% of total enrollment. 

The common denominator is the most diverse and dynamic private school sector in America, energized by 500,000 students using education choice scholarships. 

According to the most recent federal data, the number of private schools in Maryland shrank by 7% between 2011-12 and 2021-22. In Florida, it grew by 40%. 

“What Florida is offering is just mind blowing compared to Maryland,” Phil said. “If a story like this ran on the national news, people would be beating the door down.” 

‘The kid who never spoke’  

Phil and Cathy Watson have six children, all adopted. They range in age from 1 to 39. All have special challenges. 

“God picked out the six kids we have,” said Cathy, who, like Phil, is the child of a pastor. “We feel very strongly that we were called to do what we do. Our heart says we have love to give and knowledge to share. These kids need that, so it’s a match.” 

Mikayla is their fourth child. She was born with hereditary spastic paraplegia, a condition that causes progressive damage to the nervous system. 

She didn’t begin walking until she was 18 months old. Even then, her gait continued to be heavy-footed, and she was prone to falling. Her speech was also, in Phil’s description, “mushy,” and until she was 12, she didn’t talk much. 

In many ways, Mikayla is a typical teen. She loves steak and sushi and Fuego Takis. Her favorite books are “The Baby-Sitters Club” series, and her favorite movies include “Beauty and the Beast” and “Beverly Hills Chihuahua.” Many of her former classmates, though, probably had no idea. 

In school, Mikayla was “the kid who never spoke.” 

Checking a box 

As Mikayla got older, she and her parents grew increasingly frustrated with what was happening in the classroom. “She was being pushed aside,” Phil said. 

Teachers would tell her to read in a corner. Between the physical pain from her condition and the emotional turmoil of being isolated, she was crushed. Sometimes, Phil said, she’d come home and “unleash this fury on my wife and I.” 

The pandemic made things worse. In sixth grade, Mikayla was online with 65 other students. Then, three days before the start of seventh grade, the district said it no longer had the resources to support her with extra staff. Instead, she could be mainstreamed without the supports; enroll in a private school; or do a “hospital homebound” program. 

The Watsons chose the latter. Three days a week, a district employee sat with Mikayla, going over worksheets that Phil said were “way over her head.” 

“All it was,” he said, “was checking a box.” 

Just in the nick of time, the school search turned up a hit. 

Florida, the land of sunshine and learning options

What surfaced was the North Florida School of Special Education. 

“From just the pictures, I’m thinking, ‘This looks legit,’ “ Phil said. “Both of us are like, ‘Wow.’ “ 

When the Watsons called NFSSE, as it’s called for short, an administrator answered every question in detail. This was not the experience they had with some of the other private schools they called. 

At the time, Phil owned a home building company, and Cathy worked for a counseling ministry. They lived comfortably. But they were also paying tuition for another daughter in college. 

Thankfully, the administrator told them Florida had school choice scholarships. For students with special needs, they provided $10,000 or more a year. 

The Watsons couldn’t believe it. They were familiar with the concept of school choice but didn’t know the details. Maryland does not have a comparable program. 

The administrator also told them NFSSE had a wait list. But the Watsons had heard enough. 

A fortuitous phone call 

A few weeks later, they were touring the school. 

The facilities were stellar. Even better, the administrator leading their tour knew the name of every student they passed in the hallways. “We were blown away,” Phil said. “They truly care. “ 

At some point, the staff ushered Mikayla into a classroom. As her parents watched from behind one-way glass, another student greeted Mikayla with a flower made of LEGO bricks. 

For years, Mikayla had been withdrawn around other students. Not here. The shift was immediate. She and the other students were using tablets to play an interactive academic game, and “you could see her turn and laugh with the kids next to her,” Phil said. 

Minutes later, he and Cathy were in the administrator’s office, “bawling our eyes out.” 

“We said, ‘We’re all in. We have to be here. We’ll be here next week if that’s what we have to do.’” 

Days later, the Watsons were at Disney World when NFSSE called. Unexpectedly, the family of a longtime student was moving. The school had an opening. 

New friends, improved skills and boosted confidence 

Even without the choice scholarship, the Watsons would have moved. At the same time, the scholarship was invaluable. The cost was not sustainable in the long run, Phil said, especially because he had to re-start his business. 

The Watsons rented a long-term Airbnb and then an apartment before buying a house in Jacksonville. They uprooted themselves completely from Maryland, including selling their dream home. 

“That was hard,” Cathy said. “You’re leaving everything you love.” 

Mikayla’s turnaround, though, has made it all worthwhile. 

Mikayla was reading at a first-grade level when she arrived at NFSSE; now she’s at a seventh-grade level. She loves the new graphic design class. She won an award for completing 1,000 math problems. “When she got here, she couldn’t add two plus two,” Phil said. 

Her verbal skills have blossomed. She eventually told her parents something she didn’t have the ability to tell them before: In her prior school, she didn’t talk because other students laughed at her. 

At NFSSE, the “kid who never spoke” speaks quite a bit. 

One day, she served as “teacher for the day” in her personal economics class, delivering a lesson on how to make change. 

Mikayla is kind and quick to smile. She is surrounded by friends and admirers. “Mikayla is my best friend,” said a chatty girl with pigtails who waited by her side in the hallway. 

One boy held the door for Mikayla as she headed to her next class. A second hung her backpack on the back of her wheelchair. A third walked her to P.E. 

Mikayla’s confidence is growing outside of school, too. 

In the past, she wouldn’t say hi or order in a restaurant. But at Walmart the other day, Phil needed a card for a friend’s retirement, so Mikayla went to find a clerk. She came back and told him, “Aisle 9.” 

Mikayla has a bank account and a debit card. She tracks the money she earns from chores. She routinely uses the notes app on her phone to mitigate challenges with short-term memory. 

NFSSE, Cathy said, is constantly reinforcing skills and strategies to foster independence. It “pushes for potential,” just like the families do. 

Mikayla “sees that potential now; she’s excited now,” she said. 

Before NFSSE, the Watsons didn’t think Mikayla could live independently. Now they do.  

The school and the scholarship, Phil said, have “given Mikayla an opportunity for her life that we didn’t know existed.” 

He credited the state of Florida, too, for creating an education system where more schools like NFSSE can thrive. 

If only every state did that. 

More Broad Prize coverage. As we noted yesterday, the Miami-Dade school district won this year’s Broad Prize, which goes to the urban district with the most academic progress. More from the Orlando Sentinel, Christian Science Monitor, Associated Press, Education Week. The Palm Beach school district was a finalist, which is also impressive. All this is more reason to routinely compare achievement data district by district in Florida. Also worth noting: Miami-Dade is a poster child for the new definition of public education, with a broad menu of learning options and huge numbers of parents embracing them.

Charter school issues in Volusia. The Volusia school board approves improvement plans for two F-rated charter schools, reports the Daytona Beach News Journal.

PTA doesn’t like it. The Florida PTA pans the Board of Education’s decision to set steeper improvement goals for low-income and minority students, reports the Gradebook blog.

More on Amendment 8. The Tampa Bay Times gets credit for going into detail about the legal case that’s at issue here – a case that has nothing to do with vouchers. ICYMI, our take on Amendment 8 here and here.

So the Democrat supports vouchers? In this state senate race in Central Florida, yes, notes the Orlando Sentinel.

Florida’s next education commissioner will inherit a job that makes juggling chainsaws look easy. He or she must get under the hood of a complicated accountability system, ride herd on a historic shake-up of public education, dodge slings and arrows while walking a political tight rope and leap tall buildings in a single bound.

And yet, the job remains so compelling. Florida is the nation’s most promising bridge to an education system that can more fully give teachers and parents real power to help kids live out their dreams. In the last 10 to 15 years, no state has focused more on the low-income and minority students who are now a majority in Florida public schools. Simultaneously, no state has opened the door more to alternative learning options – options that have both empowered parents and multiplied the potential for educators to innovate. The result has been both dramatic and nowhere near enough. The next commissioner must find ways to continue the momentum.

To that end, we hope he or she can nimbly rotate hats long enough to also assume the role of explainer-in-chief. We know this won’t be easy; education reformers in Florida operate in an environment that is particularly tense and, in the past couple of years, has become downright ugly. But we can’t help but think that maybe, just maybe, the temperature will drop a few degrees if fair-minded people can be persuaded that not every education idea and not every education reform is a zero-sum proposition. Sometimes, they really can work in harmony with the other parts.

This is especially true with school choice. The sincere goal here isn’t “privatization,” it’s personalization. It’s about expanding options so more kids can be matched with settings that maximize their potential, and yes that includes private and faith-based options.

There’s no reason, and so far in Florida no demonstration, that these options have to come at the expense of traditional schools. It’s entirely possible – and many of us think it’s absolutely necessary – to support traditional public schools at the same time we push for additional options that, for individual students, may work better. (more…)

There’s no denying there are some bad charter schools, and that some do things that make school districts justifiably upset or rightly suspicious. School choice supporters should honestly acknowledge that and diligently help in the search for solutions. At the same time, there’s no doubt that district opposition often hinges on arguments that suggest motivations other than what’s best for kids. Take two recent examples from Florida.

In Duval County, the school board just shot down applications for two charter schools because, according to the Florida Times Union, they wanted to set up in an area where traditional public schools have 5,000 empty seats. “This would add some additional seats where we already have more than we can really manage and pay for,” the district’s chief operating officer told board members. I can’t pretend to know for sure why that part of Duval has so many under-enrolled schools. But numbers that high may reflect a combination of dwindling demand and an increasing array of learning options – phenomena that are relatively new for Florida districts and pose challenges to the historic pattern for planning new schools.

Duval received 20 charter applications this year, a record high for the third year in a row. I grew up in Duval and I’m proud of it, so it pains me to point this out: Low-income students do particularly poorly there. Next to their peers in the state’s 12 biggest districts, low-income students in Duval (the sixth biggest) ranked in the bottom three in reading in every tested grade this year, according to data recently posted on the Florida Department of Education web site. Performance like that may explain why Duval parents continue to warm to charters.

All these factors no doubt make facility planning more difficult, but officials would be wise to keep in mind that no one is forcing parents to attend these charter schools. To deny new charters based solely on traditional school enrollment patterns, then, is to appear bureaucratically heavy-handed and insensitive to the needs of students. It also, quite arbitrarily, denies parents more options.

In Volusia County, meanwhile, the superintendent recommended last month that the school board reject all nine applications for new charters. Ultimately, the board turned down four and the other five withdrew. (more…)

A few months ago, 13-year-old ninth-grader Giovanni Munnerlyn was in a public middle school in Tampa, Fla., being shuffled from one math class to another. He felt like giving up on the subject. His mom felt helpless. But last night, he and Mom (shown here) sat side by side in the computer lab at his new school, Gateway Christian Academy, taking on numbers that used to be his nemesis.

On the screen in front of him, math problems adding fractions were being served up by Khan Academy, the California-based phenomenon that is turning heads with its educational videos.

“Find the common denominator,” Giovanni said softly to himself before typing in an answer. The Khan Academy’s response: Smiley face. Giovanni squeezed his hand into a victory fist.

This little moment in a little school reflects a bigger project helping kids like Giovanni.

The new school year marks the beginning of a partnership between Khan Academy, which has drawn flattering coverage from “60 Minutes” and The New York Times, and Step Up For Students, the Florida nonprofit that administered 40,000 scholarships last year to low-income students. If I could narrate this story like Sal Khan narrates one of his videos, I’d say in his calming, authoritative voice, “Cutting-edge technology … plus school choice … equals more opportunity for low-income kids.” I’d use one of Khan's colored pens to underline the word “opportunity.”

The venture is one of only a handful that Khan Academy has forged with school systems nationwide. It’s the only one in the Tampa Bay area, and it’s the only one outside of California with a private school network. The pilot involves math instruction at 10 private schools in the Tampa area, all of which accept tax credit scholarships.

Khan Academy’s interactive tools, including thousands of short, engaging videos, are available for free to anyone who wishes to use them. But the partnership schools get additional materials so their teachers can even more effectively pinpoint where students are falling short – and then efficiently get them up to speed.

For schools in the Step Up partnership, there’s also a parental engagement piece. (more…)