DeSantis says Schools of Hope co-locations will be ‘limited’
Tampa Bay Times | Divya Kumar | January 15, 2026
At a news conference Wednesday in Pinellas County, Gov. Ron DeSantis dismissed growing concerns over a new law that would allow certain charter schools, known as Schools of Hope, to co-locate in public schools that are not at full capacity.
Speaking at Seminole High School, DeSantis said the law would only impact a few schools in “really tough areas.”
“No one school is going to be taken over,” he said. “You hear from these pretty affluent areas: ‘I don’t want a School of Hope.’ No, there’s not going to be a School of Hope there.”
DeSantis said there wouldn’t be any such schools in areas around Seminole.
“You are not going to see them in suburban Florida. That’s just not what purpose of it is,” he said. “It’s going to be limited. Now, if there’s unused space in (public) schools, we think it makes more sense to allow (the charter operators) to use to do the unused space, rather than have to build something which is costly.”
As parents and school district leaders have begun to voice opposition, a bill to repeal the law has been filed in the Legislature and the state Board of Education is poised to make revisions to the rules around the law. DeSantis insisted the law’s impact would be much smaller than many have expressed fear over.
Schools of Hope are Title I-eligible charter schools that the state authorizes seven operators to run within a 5-mile radius of persistently low-performing or low-attended public schools.
But within half an hour of the new law taking effect last fall, the state saw close to 700 inquiries from charter school operators — including from operators that are not authorized to operate in Florida. Among those targeted were 181 A-rated schools and 190 B schools.
Of the authorized operators, 221 were from Mater Academy, 10 were from KIPP and five were from Success Academy — an operator DeSantis heaped praise on.
“They (Success Academy) have a formula that really works, and they’re going into areas that really need help, where you haven’t been able to kind of dot the I’s and cross the T’s,” he said. “So you’re talking about a small number of schools around the country, maybe a few in Miami-Dade, a few in Broward, a few in Orlando.”
Citadel founder and former DeSantis donor Ken Griffin has pledged $50 million to bring Success Academy into Florida. The Academy operates almost 60 schools in New York City, and DeSantis pointed to their track record of test scores compared to public schools in that area.
DeSantis took swings at New York politicians and said the charter operator was able to succeed even in that environment where he claimed “schools are basically run by the school unions, not by the parents.”
Among authorized operators, Hillsborough County received 22 requests, Pinellas received 12 and Pasco received six Mater Academy.
Critics of the new law, which passed at the tail end of a special legislative session, say it leaves much undefined, and would add unfunded custodial, food service, nursing and transportation costs to districts. They’ve also called for further protections of new schools or newly converted schools that are not immediately enrolled, as well as schools on military installations and ESE centers.
DeSantis said he thought it was “totally fair” for the legislature to consider fine-tuning the rules to ensure that additional electricity and janitorial costs don’t fall to the districts.
“I know the legislature is working on it, and I think that’s very, very reasonable, so it’s not going to be a burden,” he said.
