Survey numbers show more dissatisfaction at Jennings Middle School in Hillsborough

We didn’t have to ask the teachers at Jennings Middle School if they, like Bianca Goolsby, had concerns about the school.

The Hillsborough County School District did.

A survey, taken in January with the help of a consulting firm, backs up some of the complaints made by Goolsby, a 29-year-old business technology teachers who made waves when she published an essay about why she is quitting the teaching profession.

Here are the results of ASQI, a survey that this year replaced the teacher survey known as TELL. The right hand column shows average positive responses to statements that essentially amount to, “the school feels safe,” “teachers are given the right materials” and “the community supports us.” Dark blue means strongly agree, light blue means agree.

To the left are the average responses from teachers at Jennings. The darker the red, the less agreement there is with the positive statements.

Here are some of the biggest discrepancies between the Jennings teacher responses and the rest of the district:

1. To the statement, “teachers are allowed to focus on educating students with minimal interference,” the response rate was 70 percent for the district, 33 percent at Jennings.

2. “Non-instructional time for teachers is sufficient”: 67 percent for the district, 26 percent at Jennings.

3. “The school environment is clean and well maintained”: 83 percent for the district, 59 percent at Jennings.

4. “Stakeholders know what is going on in this school”: 84 percent for the district, 49 percent at Jennings.

5. “Community members support teachers, which contributes to their success with students”: 80 percent for the district, 23 percent at Jennings.

6. “Students at this school follow rules of conduct”: 64 percent for the district, 6.5 percent at Jennings.

7. “The faculty is working in a school environment that is safe": 89 percent for the district, 41 percent at Jennings.

District leaders said Monday that they have worked diligently for the last two years to try and improve conditions and results at Jennings, which is based in Seffner but also buses in many students from a Tampa neighborhood where the middle schools are used as magnets.

A new administrative team is in place led by Latonya Anderson, who took over as principal in April.

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