In his 2004, the school district’s auditor diagramed the relationships in the sale and subsequent lease of the Agnes McReynolds school. Celeste Lewis wore three hats: Executive Director of the Jackie Harris…
Tag: Escambia County School District
ECSD 2004 internal audit report questioned the sale of McReynolds school
Inweekly has reviewed a May 2004 internal audit report of the Jackie Harris Pyramid School of Learning (JHPSL)- currently called Jacqueline Harris Preparatory Academy. The report raised several questions about how school…
Escambia charter school pays lease on building it no longer uses
PENSACOLA: A review of four years of audited financial statements of the Jacqueline Harris Preparatory Academy, a charter school founded by former ECUA board member Celestine Lewis, revealed the school paid $11,000…
Online survey re:appointed superintendent
The Appointed Superintendent Search Portal has been opened and includes a survey that can be found by visiting the Escambia County School District’s website, ecsd.fl.schoolloop.com. The survey will be posted under the Quicklinks…
Viewpoint: Teachers need more support
By Kimberly Sullivan The Escambia County School District recently congratulated itself for the slight increase in the number of A, B and C schools within the district. Unfortunately, the bar is set…
Doing the Super Majority Dance
On Thursday, Aug.15, the Escambia County School Board held another workshop to discuss the proposed policies for the appointed superintendent. At the top of the discussion was Section 5 of the policies…
Has Malcolm Thomas seen this?
Research 101: Solid, documented facts can be found using the “Google Machine.” In 2015, Steven Soules of the University of Central Florida produced “An Evaluation of the Terms and Conditions of Appointed…
St. Lucie also pays 20 weeks severance
The St. Lucie County School District is similar in student population to Escambia County and is ranked #30 in the state. It has an appointed superintendent that can be fired by three…
CivicCon: Successful school systems let parents hire principals
At last night’s CivicCon, Dr. Ron Ferguson attributed the success of Chicago Public Schools (CPS) to its focus on quality principals. He mentioned that parents get to hire the principals for their…
Law says severance limited to 20 weeks
Florida statutes limit severance pay to 20 weeks – which explains why the contracts for Escambia County Administrator and St. Johns Superintendent of Schools both limited any severance to 20 weeks. The…
Every Escambia school district has problems
Inweekly reviewed the school grades and total points earned for the non-charter elementary, middle and high schools in the state of Florida. We ranked them from the bottom to see how they…
Campus Security Officers down to nine
Last week, Escambia County School Superintendent Malcolm Thomas told WEAR TVÂ that the district had 18 people being trained as campus safety officers. Today, only nine trainees will graduate from the training program,…
District chooses to allocate less to teachers’ salaries
Government officials can always find money for what the items they want to fund. Santa Rosa and Okaloosa school districts have allocated the funds to pay their teachers more than Escambia County….
Thomas defends millage cut, ignores capital needs
Superintendent Malcolm Thomas defended his rollback of the millage rate to the Pensacola News Journal saying the revenue cut couldn’t have improved teachers’ salaries. Thomas said the part of the millage rate…
Struggling district cuts millage
Parents have contacted Inweekly about the Escambia County School Board’s vote yesterday to cut the millage from 6.325 in 2018-2019, to 6.043 in 2019-2020. In the district’s press release, School Superintendent Malcolm…
Newpoint scandal: District ‘asleep’ while millions stolen
Last year, Marcus May, the founder of Newpoint Education Partners, was convicted of stealing over $5.2 million through a complicated scheme involving Newpoint-managed charter schools in Escambia, Bay, Broward, Duval, Hillsborough, Holmes…
School district ‘mini communist state’
Escambia County teachers have been sharing their challenges, issues and views on what is happening in their classrooms. The picture that they paint is very different from the rosy one promulgated by…
Escambia 8th graders may have trouble competing for jobs
Around 90 million American workers will require some degree of new training to hold onto their jobs in the near future, according to Andy Van Kleunen, CEO of the National Skills Coalition…
Thomas celebrates C’s
The Florida Department of Education issued 2018-19 school and district grades last Thursday. The state focused on “Aâ€â€™s and “Bâ€â€™s as the measure for success.  In the press release, Education Commissioner Richard…
Recap: Escambia County School District
The Escambia County School District earned a B for the 2018-19 school year. However, the district performed poorly when compared to other large school districts with more than 20,000 students. Of the…
