2 min read January 2022 — Despite the pandemic, Tampa Preparatory School saw its highest enrollment ever in fall 2021. “Our early start with mobile learning enabled us to quickly hunt for new relationships and maintain that sense of community. We wanted to make clear what it meant to be a student in this space, whether a sixth grader or senior,” Headmaster Kevin Plummer told Invest:.
How do you take lessons learned from the pandemic to move the school forward?
Well before COVID-19, we were already exploring the flipped classroom modality. This model gave us the space to introduce topics without the instructor and to help kids develop the skills to identify questions and points they are unclear on and then work with that with a teacher in the classroom. The school believes in tech devices as an appropriate tool for that type of learning. We rolled out the 1:1 iPad program for all our students five or six years before the pandemic hit. We are fortunate to be a sixth-12 grade school, so we are not battling with dexterity or familiarity with technology. We also have an innovative and creative faculty that was willing to go into this digital space to maximize each 50-minute period with each student. Our posture of readiness became about the opportunity at hand and we didn’t have to reinvent the wheel.
With that level of preparedness, was there an impact on enrollment?
Oddly, there was a positive impact on enrollment. In Fall 2021, we had our largest school opening in history with 705 students. The pandemic allowed our Greater Tampa community to see us as a school that was not only ready to embrace the nuts and bolts of teaching and learning, but also the harder work of maintaining community and relationships. Our early start with mobile learning enabled us to quickly hunt for new relationships and maintain that sense of community. We wanted to make clear what it meant to be a student in this space, whether a sixth grader or senior. I really enjoyed how quickly our community embraced the establishment of new traditions for us. I am very proud of our students for embracing a new norm so readily and so quickly and seeing them apply etiquette and decorum to their interactions with these technologies.
The Harkness Discussion is a teaching model Tampa Prep has implemented to encourage student engagement and collaboration. What impact have you seen from this on the atmosphere and moral compass of students at the school?
A Harkness circle will have a large group of 12 to 14 students at a table with everyone counting on each other to bring something to the conversation as a part of their grade. It is kind, relational and aware, while enforcing preparation as a key value. If a student started winging it, it would be disrespectful to everyone. Harkness has brought a real sense of integrity to the preparation and intellectual exercise of education. We see it not only in history and English but math and science as well, instilling an ethos of preparation, participation and engagement by bringing the best version of yourself each day. Harkness also understands that real life happens. When a student or family is having a challenge, Harkness allows us to be aware of that and build peer-to peer-support and comfort.
What is your outlook for Tampa prep and the education sector over the next three to five years? What are your priorities?
I am concerned about education as an industry in our area. I look at the resources we have at Tampa Prep and I ask why is this not available in more places for more students? Failure has to happen where it is recognized and understood and where you get support to get to the other side of it. We want kids to learn that failure is a learning process, but that environment does not exist for all kids. My deep fear is that the process of education has lost some real geniuses along the way because they became disengaged.
Beyond that, this is a region looking for innovation and smarts. It is looking for agility, partnerships and collaborations. We need to be 30% to 70% different from where we are right now and we need to hustle for the new opportunities here. Twenty-one new tech companies have moved to the region in the past 12 months and they will be looking for relationships that make them comfortable hiring talent from this region, so we will look to grow those opportunities.
Overall, my outlook is super-positive. I am grateful for my 130 colleagues, who are incredible. It does not matter what their role is, our people are in it to win it. And I love my students. I am really excited for what these young people will do moving forward. I am grateful for our families. We did COVID differently and without the support and belief of the adults in the community, we would not have gotten to where we are now.
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