Laura Bowes, an executive director in the Duval County Public Schools Division of Schools, explains to parents and stakeholders at R.L. Brown Gifted and Talented Academy that the district's staff plans to recommend that R.V. Daniels Elementary in Grand Park be merged with R.L. Brown at the end of this academic year. She spoke during a meeting Thursday, Feb. 15, 2024. | Will Brown, Jacksonville Today
Published on February 16, 2024 at 5:41 pm
Duval County Public Schools staff will recommend the School Board close R.V. Daniels Elementary at the end of this academic year.
Laura Bowes, an executive director in the district’s Division of Schools, held separate meetings with the School Advisory Committee at both R.V. Daniels and R.L. Brown Gifted and Talented Academy on Thursday afternoon. During those discussions with nearly two dozen parents, Bowes outlined how the process would take place.
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The School Board would vote to consolidate the two dedicated magnet schools during its meeting March 5. The School Board will meet Feb. 20 to prepare its agenda for its March meeting.
School district staff told parents and stakeholders at R.L. Brown on Thursday that if approved by the board, R.V. Daniels would close at the end of this academic year. Students would transfer to R.L. Brown for the 2024-25 academic year. Renovations at R.L. Brown would begin later this year and finish in time for the 2025-26 academic year.
R.V. Daniels is an academic magnet in the Grand Park neighborhood. R.L. Brown is an academic magnet on the Eastside. An interstate separates the two schools, meaning the scores of walkers and bike riders who traverse the sidewalk along 13th Street near R.V. Daniels before and after school could not safely make the trek to R.L. Brown.
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Both schools, according to data Bowes presented Thursday, have enrollments well below their buildings’ capacity.
District officials told parents that because the R.L. Brown campus is larger and newer than R.V. Daniels, students from the latter would be moved to the Eastside and educated at the school named after an architect and builder who served in the Florida Legislature during Reconstruction.
“So the benefit to you guys is there is no transition for you,” Bowes told R.L. Brown parents.
Bowes told parents the consolidation was part of the district’s plan to update its facilities with monies it receives through the half-cent sales tax that voters approved in 2020.
“The big thing is reducing the age of our buildings as a whole,” Bowes said during her presentation. “The academic benefits to students, there are more resources for students, more opportunities for teachers to collaborate and improve pedagogy.”
In January, Jacksonville Today filed a public records request with Duval County Public Schools, amid questions from Southside parents and community members about the consolidation process of elementary schools there. Jacksonville Today requested “a list of any other schools in the district that have been considered for consolidation prior to the 2026 academic year.”
The district noted 17 schools were part of its consolidation plan until 2026. None of those were R.V. Daniels or R.L. Brown.
At its meeting Feb. 6, the School Board unanimously approved construction documents that would allow a project that would expand the parking lot, create a new vestibule as well at R.L. Brown to begin later this calendar year.
Bowes told R.L. Brown stakeholders that decision was made in order to anticipate an influx of students.
According to a printed presentation provided to attendees Thursday, the district plans to spend $6.15 million on renovations and improvements at R.L. Brown.
Also, during the meeting Feb. 6, the School Board accepted the findings of a Castaldi Analysis district staff conducted at R.V. Daniels as well as Windy Hill, Annie R. Morgan and S.P. Livingston elementary schools and will send them to the Florida Department of Education.
A Castaldi Analysis uses a formula to determine whether a school should be renovated, remodeled or demolished. It found R.V. Daniels, a school with 194 students, needed $7.38 million to remodel. The school opened in 1964.
“The cost benefit and condition assessment using the Castaldi formula for R.V. Daniels Elementary School buildings suggests that the cost associated with remodeling exceeds the cost of completely replacing the structures,” the district analysis found.
The DCPS Castaldi analyses concluded:
- S.P. Livingston should be replaced on site and consolidated with Susie Tolbert Elementary school.
- Windy Hill should be demolished and students consolidated into Southside Estates Elementary.
- Annie R. Morgan should be consolidated into Biltmore Elementary School.
If the board approves the proposed consolidation, it would close R.V. Daniels, a school that has been a part of the Grand Park neighborhood as an elementary school and seventh grade center for 60 years.
Jacksonville Today asked Bowes about the timing of Thursday’s meeting, which took place while applications for magnet schools are open and its effect on students and families at both schools for the 2024-25 academic year. A board decision about whether to consolidate after the current academic year would be made after the magnet school enrollment period ends on Feb. 29. Bowes referred questions to the district’s communications team.
The district’s director of school choice, Jacqueline Kelley, says students who are affected by the consolidation — if it’s approved by the district — would be accommodated.
“School choice has always worked individually with the parents who are impacted at both schools, so that they are still able to make choices, if this impacts their decision of where they wanted their child to go,” Kelley said. “That becomes an individual process. We work with each parent, so that they still have a choice.”
Disclosure: Jacksonville Today reporter Will Brown is a parent of a student at one of the two impacted schools.
Lead image: Laura Bowes, an executive director in the Duval County Public Schools Division of Schools, explains to parents and stakeholders at R.L. Brown Gifted and Talented Academy that the district’s staff plans to recommend that R.V. Daniels Elementary in Grand Park be merged with R.L. Brown at the end of this academic year. She spoke during a meeting Thursday, Feb. 15, 2024. | Will Brown, Jacksonville Today
