The top reported proficiency rate is 53% in Science. The lowest is 49% in Math.
Original Research by School Decision on Mount Vernon Elementary School
Mount Vernon Elementary sits on the north side of St. Petersburg, a regular public school serving prekindergarten through fifth grade within Pinellas County Schools. The school draws a population that is economically mixed, with a substantial majority of students qualifying for free or reduced-price lunch. The student body is racially and ethnically diverse, with white, Black, Hispanic, Asian, and multiracial students all represented in meaningful shares. Data on English learners and students with IEPs were not available in what was provided.
On Florida's FAST assessments for the most recent school year, Mount Vernon's results land in the middle range for the tested grades. In third-grade math, roughly three in five students scored proficient, which is the school's strongest math result; proficiency drops in fourth and fifth grade, where fewer than half of students reached the bar. ELA tells a somewhat different story: third grade sits just below half proficient, fourth grade is about even with that, and fifth grade rises back to a level comparable to the third-grade math result. On the fifth-grade science assessment, just over half of students scored proficient. Trend data across years was not available, so it is not possible to say whether these results are improving, holding steady, or declining. A parent who wants to understand the trajectory would be worth asking the school directly about that picture, and about what targeted support looks like for students who are not yet at proficiency. The comparison framework for individual schools within Pinellas County was not applicable given the structure of the county's district data, so a direct positioning against neighboring schools is not available here.
The district context matters. Pinellas County Schools publicly reported earning a state "A" grade for the first time in its history in 2024, tied in part to a custom ELA curriculum built around the science of reading and aligned to Florida's B.E.S.T. standards. That curriculum shift started in the early grades and extends through fifth grade, which is exactly the range Mount Vernon serves. The district also passed a local-option school property tax renewal in late 2024, doubling the rate for a multi-year period; the publicly reported purpose includes teacher and staff bonuses and programs in reading, music, art, and technology. For a family buying a home near this school, that tax change is a concrete ongoing cost to factor in, and a signal that the community has continued to invest in school staffing and programming through the ballot.
St. Petersburg itself is a large, active city with a walkable downtown core, a culturally dense Central Avenue corridor, major employers in finance, manufacturing, health care, and marine science, and a transit network that publicly reported includes bus rapid transit and a downtown trolley. The neighborhood around Mount Vernon is residential, set in the grid of streets that characterizes the city's mid-century north side. Housing values in the immediate zip code have edged downward year over year as of the most recent data, while rents have remained roughly flat. Compared to the statewide market, home values here track somewhat below the Florida median, which may appeal to buyers who want to be in a city with St. Petersburg's breadth but not at the price point of the highest-demand neighborhoods closer to the water. The city overall is in an active development phase, with downtown growth, affordable housing construction, and a large-scale redevelopment around the former Tropicana Field site all underway.
For a family evaluating whether this school fits, the honest read is that academic proficiency results are moderate rather than high, and without trend data the direction is unclear. The school serves a genuinely economically and racially diverse student body in an urban neighborhood, which some families actively seek and others weigh differently. The district's recent curriculum investments and its first-ever state "A" are real context, though school-level outcomes at Mount Vernon are where they are, and a visit and conversation with the principal about instructional supports and recent changes would give a much clearer picture than the numbers alone.
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