Advertisement

Enrollment continues to grow in Hillsborough schools

 
Published Sept. 17, 2014

TAMPA — Students continue to fill seats in Hillsborough County's public schools, with enrollment climbing to 206,099 and charter school enrollment growing by 12 percent.

The total, contained in a 20-day count that the school district conducts every year for planning purposes, marks a 2.3 percent increase over the 2013 count of 201,363.

Enrollment in the county grew rapidly during the housing boom that began in the mid 1990s, stalled during the recession and has been rebounding for the past five years. The student population in 2009 was about 193,000.

Charter school enrollment has grown even faster, increasing from 9,255 in September 2011 to 13,569 in September 2013 and 15,197 this year.

With the addition of six new charter schools this year, officials had prepared to see that population reach almost 20,000. Instead, Hillsborough's charter school growth is about on par with the state's. Close to one in 13 Hillsborough public schoolchildren attend charters, according to the latest numbers.

Although breakdowns by school and area were not available Tuesday, district officials have long anticipated growth in south Hillsborough, where home building has picked up and Amazon's new warehouse distribution center is nearing completion.

To accommodate that growth, the district this year opened Thompson Elementary in Riverview. It is also building an addition to Lennard High School in Ruskin. Plans call for a new middle school in Balm in 2016 and a K-8 school in the area in 2018.

Contact Marlene Sokol at sokol@tampabay.com or (813) 226-3356. Follow @marlenesokol.