Public charter school for migrant farmworker families plans to open in Mulberry

A dual-language charter school primarily for the underserved children of migrant farmworkers is expected to open in August in Mulberry, according to leaders of the school's operator, Redlands Christian Migrant Association.

Juana Brown, charter school director for RCMA, shared their plans April 25 during a Polk County School Board workshop in Bartow, saying the new Mulberry Community Academy will add kindergarten and first grade next school year to the current preschool-aged programing already offered on its campus.

“We are bringing children of migrant farmworkers and other agricultural workers a program that first and foremost continues the RCMA model,” Brown said by phone Wednesday of the new charter in Polk.

A million people in Polk? Local leaders discuss the biggest changes at State of Polk event

Impassioned pleas Polk School Board agrees to renew embattled charter school for 5 years

2024 elections New candidates emerge for Polk County Commission, School Board

The organization engages with parents starting with the Head Start program, teaching them about technology and languages. A council of parents take on leadership roles at RCMA, she said.

“There's a whole host of what we like to call ‘parent university’ so that parents are able to also extend their own learning and build capacity and agency,” Brown said. Whole family learning touches on language, health and technology among many other needs.

Students at RCMA are taught half the day in Spanish and the other half in English, which is an important component to getting parents involved in their students' education, she said.

The organization also provides programs for health care and parenting workshops on the developmental stages of students to support stronger parenting at each grade level. The schools also try to close the technology gap with their family education component.

The principal-in-residence at Mulberry Community Academy will be Dani Higgins.

The RCMA submitted a notice of intent March 15 to Polk County Public Schools that it plans to open the charter school by August in time for the next school year. On May 11 last year, RCMA gained the Hope School designation from the Florida Department of Education.

RCMA, Mater Academy and IDEA are among the five Schools of Hope that are either operating or planned for Polk County, the FDOE website shows.

Per Florida statute, an operator seeking to open a School of Hope must submit its intent letter to the district where the State Board of Education has identified a persistently low-performing school. That school was listed as Purcell Elementary, about five miles from Mulberry Community Academy. 

At RCMA in Mulberry, the rural and migrant students would learn and develop within a familiar setting after attending Head Start, and they'd have teachers and staff who they already know and who have a similar background.

In addition to the state and school district, RCMA has partnered with the Charter School Growth Fund, which helps finance charter schools, whether just starting out or scaling up.

The Mulberry Community Academy will eventually serve 360 students in grades kindergarten through eight when full enrollment is completed by 2031, its letter of intent said. It will open with two classrooms of kindergarten and first-grade students and will grow one grade level each year, adding two classrooms of each grade in subsequent years until full enrollment is complete.

The 33-acre RCMA campus in southern Polk County already has buildings to expand its new grade-level offerings.

RCMA’s history with farmworker families in Polk County dates to 1981, when the organization began to offer support services to the migrant farmworkers in rural areas of the county. In 2010, the Mulberry Early Childhood Center was opened to offer day care for 6-week-olds to toddlers.

The Immokalee-based RCMA now has 1,600 staff statewide. It began offering services to underserved children in 1965 and opened its first school in 2000.

This article originally appeared on The Ledger: Migrant farmworker organization opening charter school in Mulberry