Shannon NickinsonTim Wyrosdick has a big idea that could change the educational and economic future of the Pensacola metro area.
If you have $55 million, he says he can provide the staff and students to fill it.
“It’s a pie-in-the-sky dream kind of thing,” says Wyrosdick, Santa Rosa County School District superintendent.
The idea – Innovation High School – was born from a conversation Wyrosdick had with Santa Rosa economic development director Shannon Ogletree after a chamber of commerce meeting.
Wyrosdick says he asked Ogletree what kinds of skills he needed in the workforce. The answer reflects the five “colleges” Wyrosdick would create in Innovation High School.
- Aerospace engineering.
- Biomedical science.
- Computer integrated manufacturing.
- Computer science engineering.
- Entrepreneurship.
“This school is about generating a labor supply for Northwest Florida and the aviation corridor with the specific components of industry we are being told we need labor supply for,” Wyrosdick says. “Thirty years in education taught me we can’t sit in silos. I see Santa Rosa County joined at the hip with Escambia County and Okaloosa County. We’ve got to think regionally or we won’t prosper.”
Innovation High School strikes at the heart of what Wyrosdick, and others, believe needs to change about the education model.
One is the belief that the only valuable educational path is one that ends in a four-year college degree.
“You can be successful without a four-year college degree,” Wyrosdick says. “Will you be more successful with one? In some areas, you will be. But not in others.”
Another is the wall that educators, parents and students have built between technical education and academic rigor.
“One of the greatest barriers we have is disassociating technical education with students who can’t do academics,” he says. “That’s one of the four pillars of this project.” (See the presentation here.)
Innovation High School will meld an academic environment for industry certifications into Advanced Placement, International Baccalaureate and dual enrollment programs all in the same school.
That would allow students to earn certifications in, say, Microsoft Office’s suite of products while they are in school. Presumably, no matter what career track they take, that certification would benefit them in the workplace.
“I have really good high schools, A’s and B’s. This school would draw some of the cream off the top,” says Wyrosdick. “I think if we built this school, it would cause Milton, Jay, Pace Navarre and Gulf Breeze to become better. I believe it would generate a different school in Pace High School.”
The precedent exists.
“Sen. (Don) Gaetz was influential in passing a law that allowed AP and industry certification to be taught in the same classroom,” Wyrosdick says. “We need more of that.”
The school would be a school-choice option open to students throughout Escambia, Santa Rosa and Okaloosa counties.
“Why do we draw barriers by county lines? Because of how we’re funded,” Wyrosdick says. “It would bankrupt Santa Rosa County to build it now.”
Escambia County has an International Baccalaureate program at Pensacola High School. The academically rigorous program is a draw for high-performing students who are college-bound.
Santa Rosa doesn’t have an IB program because, Wyrosdick says, traditionally they are put in a district’s poorest school.
In Santa Rosa, that’s Milton High School.
“My difficulty is this: Is a kid from Gulf Breeze going to come all the way to Milton?” says Wyrosdick. “Or are they going to go to Pensacola High? They’re already going to PHS – 83 of them. I want those 83 back.”
Rick Harper, director of the Studer Institute, says that by linking specific job skills and competencies with a rigorous academic curriculum, the new school will help students be better prepared for tomorrow’s labor market.
Coursework that is designed to link later to college and university courses is smart, because it takes advantage of the new legislative funding formulas intended to reward job market readiness while preparing kids for further education, he says.
“It may be a heavy lift legislatively,” Harper says. “While the governor has proposed record K-12 per student funding for the coming year, the capital facilities budget is likely to still be tight. Tallahassee would likely look to the local school district to raise a lot of the revenue needed to build this facility.”
Wyrosdick has his district’s statewide reputation for excellence as a key selling point of the idea. Geography, too, works in his favor.
Map the so-called “aerospace corridor” and Santa Rosa is centrally located.
As the workforce’s demands change, so would the Innovation High School. One district can’t move as quickly as business needs it to fill gaps in the labor force, “but one school can,” he says.
Wyrosdick has pitched the idea to AppRiver, Gulf Power, Navy Federal Credit Union. University of West Florida is enthusiastic about the possibilities, as are chambers of commerce in both counties.
“To change a region economically, to provide the educational opportunity that says we really believe in this area, that’s a different statement to me,” he says.
Wyrosdick says he can’t generate the tax revenue (in Santa Rosa County) to build it, so he will ask the Legislature to build it through a special facilities request of $55 million over five years.
“They won’t give me that,” he says. “They’re going to tell me no – 100 percent of them.
“I’m seeking an appointment with the governor. He is going to tell me no; he’s vetoed every request like this that’s come to him.”
He says that building the school would require a waiver from state rules about spending public education capital outlay dollars. PECO money can only be spent once a district is maxed out of space with the facilities it already has.
But Wyrosdick’s plan requires a “build it and they will come” attitude.
And he is convinced they will come – from Santa Rosa, Escambia and Okaloosa counties.
With a virtual school element tied into the curriculum, they could come from Charlotte County, Hillsborough County or anywhere in the state.
“What better investment could you make in a region of $55 million? What do you think that would generate for our economy? Construction alone is two times (the dollar amount),” Wyrosdick says. “And down the road, if we bring in one Avalex or AppRiver or something larger, why not?
“Change occurs when a need is seen and you wash away the can’t-dos. This can’t happen. But it will. I really believe that.”
Shannon Nickinson is the editor of PensacolaToday.com, a news and commentary site in Pensacola. Follow her on Twitter @snickinson. Column courtesy of Context Florida.
