The top reported proficiency rate is 65% in Math. The lowest is 54% in English language arts.
Original Research by School Decision on Bear Creek Elementary School
Bear Creek Elementary sits on the south St. Petersburg side of a large urban district, serving children from pre-kindergarten through fifth grade. It is a small school for its grade band, with a student body that is majority Black and includes substantial Hispanic and white populations as well. A large majority of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, which is worth naming plainly because it shapes the economic context of the building and is often connected to resource needs the district and school work to address.
On the most recent Florida state assessments, the school's results are mixed and generally sit below where many families hope to see a neighborhood elementary. In math, third and fourth graders showed solid proficiency, with fourth grade reaching a notably strong level. Fifth-grade math and third-grade reading, though, came in closer to half of students reaching proficiency. Fourth-grade reading was similar to third grade, while fifth-grade reading and fifth-grade science were meaningfully stronger, with the majority of fifth graders testing proficient in both. The overall picture across grades and subjects is uneven, and parents who want to dig into specific grade-level trends would do well to ask the school directly, particularly about the gap between fourth-grade math and fifth-grade math.
Trend data was not available in the records we reviewed, so it is not possible to say whether these results reflect improvement, decline, or stability over recent years.
Two district-level developments are relevant context. Pinellas County Schools earned its first-ever top state grade in 2024, driven in part by a custom science-of-reading ELA curriculum the district developed and rolled out starting in the earliest grades, extending into grades three through five. Whether that shift is fully reflected yet in Bear Creek's specific results is unclear, but the approach is in place. Separately, voters in late 2024 approved expanding a local school property tax, doubling the prior rate, to support teacher and staff bonuses and programs including reading, music, art, and technology. For a prospective homebuyer in the attendance zone, that is a real and lasting cost to factor in; for a parent already enrolled, it represents a stabilized funding stream for the programs their child uses.
IEP and English learner rates were not available in the data we reviewed; a parent with a child who may need either service should ask the school and district directly about support staffing and programming.
The school sits in St. Petersburg, a city in the middle of an extended growth and redevelopment phase anchored by a dense, walkable downtown core and a coastline-framing park network. Publicly reported information describes a major urban redevelopment stretching across dozens of acres near Tropicana Field, mixed-use construction spreading beyond the downtown core, and citywide affordable and workforce housing completions and pipeline. The housing market in the zip code has seen home values ease over the past year, moving slightly below the state average and close to the national average, while rents have been essentially flat. The price-to-income ratio still reflects meaningful affordability pressure at current mortgage rates.
Major employers in the area include Raymond James Financial, Jabil, Johns Hopkins All Children's Hospital, and a cluster of marine and life sciences institutions downtown, which gives the local economy a diverse base. The Pinellas Suncoast Transit Authority runs bus rapid transit connecting downtown to the beaches, along with a downtown trolley, which matters for families without cars or with working parents relying on transit.
Program details specific to Bear Creek were not available in the data we reviewed. For families weighing this school, the academic results warrant a direct conversation with the principal about what intervention and enrichment the school provides and how it is tracking progress across grade levels.
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