The top reported proficiency rate is 43% in English language arts. The lowest is 31% in Science.
Original Research by School Decision on Manatee School of Arts/sciences
Manatee School of Arts and Sciences is a small charter elementary school in Bradenton, serving kindergarten through fifth grade from a campus on 32nd Street West. Its enrollment is quite small for a K-5 program, and the school draws a student body that is predominantly Hispanic and white, with a meaningful share of multiracial students. A large majority of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, which means this is a school serving families with broadly limited household incomes. Data on English learners and students with IEPs was not available in what we reviewed.
The school's name signals an arts and sciences orientation, though no formal program details were provided in the data we received. Parents curious about what that identity means in practice, whether integrated arts instruction, project-based science, or a particular instructional model, would want to ask the school directly.
On Florida's state assessments, the picture is uneven and warrants careful attention. In third and fourth grade, reading and math proficiency rates sit in a modest range, with fourth-grade ELA the clearest relative strength. The fifth-grade results in both math and ELA, along with the fifth-grade science assessment, are considerably lower and stand out even against the school's own earlier grades. It is not clear from the data whether the fifth-grade cohort is unusually small, recently arrived, or experiencing something specific in that year of instruction, and a parent would reasonably want to explore this further with the school's leadership. Trend data across years was not available, so it is not possible to say whether scores are improving, declining, or holding steady.
Because Manatee County has only one school district in the comparison set, a meaningful peer comparison against other county districts was not possible, and the proficiency index comparison was excluded for that reason.
The surrounding Bradenton community is a city anchored by a compact downtown along the Manatee River, with the Village of the Arts nearby, a walkable Riverwalk with public amenities, and a weekly public market running through spring. Employers in the area include the School District of Manatee County itself, Manatee Memorial Hospital, Tropicana's main plant, Bealls, First Watch, and the IMG sports academy. Public transit through MCAT connects Bradenton, Palmetto, and beach communities, and fixed-route buses have been made fare-free under a county pilot program.
Housing near the school is moderately priced relative to Florida's statewide median, and home values in the zip code have dipped modestly in the past year. Rents have similarly softened. The broader city is growing, and the wider metro area has seen substantial new apartment construction, a pattern tied to ongoing in-migration from other parts of the country.
At the district level, a few things are worth knowing. Manatee County voters renewed a one-mill property tax in late 2024 that funds teacher salary supplements, extended instructional time, STEM and arts programs, career and technical education, athletics, early literacy, and school safety. Because Manatee School of Arts and Sciences is a charter, publicly reported information indicates charter schools are among the programs supported by those funds, though a parent should confirm directly what share of referendum dollars flows to this particular school. The district has also redrawn attendance boundaries for traditional elementary and middle schools in response to rapid enrollment growth, though as a charter, this school's enrollment process is separate from those zone assignments. Security upgrades including AI-based weapon detection systems were deployed at the district's high schools and randomly at middle schools; this school serves only elementary grades, so those specific measures do not apply here.
For a family considering this school, the arts and sciences identity and small enrollment may appeal as a deliberate alternative to a larger neighborhood school. The academic results, particularly at the upper elementary level, are an open question worth pursuing in conversation with the school.
See more original research from School Decision →