Sarasota Academy of the Arts, Sarasota FL

Original Research by School Decision on Sarasota Academy of the Arts

Sarasota Academy of the Arts is a small charter school on Fruitville Road serving kindergarten through eighth grade. Its enrollment is modest, placing it among the smaller schools for its grade band. A majority of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, which means it serves a population with a meaningful share of economic need. The student body is predominantly white and Hispanic, with smaller shares of Black, Asian, and multiracial students. Data on English learners and students with IEPs was not available in our sources.

The school's identity, as the name suggests, centers on arts integration. Publicly reported information from the school's own website indicates it uses Florida's B.E.S.T. Standards curriculum with aligned materials, following the same state framework as the surrounding Sarasota County district. That context matters for reading test results: Florida moved from its prior state assessment to the FAST assessment in recent years, and the data here reflects those newer results rather than a longer comparable trend.

On reading and language arts, third grade results are genuinely strong, with most students scoring proficient. Fourth grade holds up reasonably well. Fifth and sixth grade ELA results, though, drop substantially, and while seventh and eighth grade recover to roughly half of students proficient, those middle grades represent a gap a parent should ask the school to explain directly. Math tells a similar story with more variation: third grade math is solid and eighth grade math is also relatively strong, but fourth through sixth grade math proficiency is low, with fifth grade particularly thin. Fifth grade science mirrors those results, while eighth grade science is stronger. The uneven pattern across grades, with some cohorts performing well and others quite weakly in the same subjects, is worth raising with school leadership when visiting.

No trend data was available, so it is not possible from this snapshot to say whether these results are improving, stable, or declining. The school serves only through eighth grade, so no graduation rate applies here.

The school sits within the Sarasota County public charter framework. Voters in November 2024 renewed the county's property tax millage that funds teacher retention, arts programs, and extended instruction, with a portion now flowing to charter schools proportionate to enrollment. That renewed funding is publicly reported as locked in through 2030 and is relevant to what this school can draw on. Separately, the district is restructuring several elementary campuses into K-8 formats with new programming, a change that could shift the competitive and enrollment landscape for a school like this one over the coming years.

Sarasota itself is a Gulf Coast city with a well-established arts identity, a walkable downtown core near the bayfront, and strong cultural institutions including the Sarasota Opera, Florida Studio Theatre, and Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall. The surrounding housing market has cooled modestly from its recent peak, with home values running near or slightly below the state midpoint and rents drifting down as new supply has entered the market. The area is still absorbing substantial in-migration, and new development, particularly east of the city center and along the suburban growth corridors, continues to add residents and families.

For a family drawn to arts-centered learning in a small school setting, and comfortable with the charter model, this school offers a specific kind of environment. The academic results warrant a direct conversation with the school about what drives the grade-to-grade swings and what support looks like for students who fall behind in the middle years.

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Academic performance

How students perform on state tests, by grade, set against the district.

Math

Grade 374%

School 74% · District 73% · ▲ 1 pts above district

▲ 11 pts above state median · ▲ 3 pts above county median

Grade 436%

School 36% · District 72% · ▼ 36 pts below district

▼ 25 pts below state median · ▼ 34 pts below county median

Grade 515%

School 15% · District 66% · ▼ 51 pts below district

▼ 40 pts below state median · ▼ 48 pts below county median

Grade 633%

School 33% · District 68% · ▼ 35 pts below district

▼ 29 pts below state median · ▼ 32 pts below county median

Grade 748%

School 48% · District 73% · ▼ 25 pts below district

▼ 1 pts below state median · ▼ 22 pts below county median

Grade 869%

School 69% · District 52% · ▲ 17 pts above district

▲ 18 pts above state median · ▲ 19 pts above county median

English language arts

Grade 389%

School 89% · District 67% · ▲ 22 pts above district

▲ 33 pts above state median · ▲ 25 pts above county median

Grade 473%

School 73% · District 67% · ▲ 6 pts above district

▲ 19 pts above state median · ▲ 8 pts above county median

Grade 520%

School 20% · District 62% · ▼ 42 pts below district

▼ 34 pts below state median · ▼ 40 pts below county median

Grade 646%

School 46% · District 66% · ▼ 20 pts below district

▼ 14 pts below state median · ▼ 18 pts below county median

Grade 755%

School 55% · District 65% · ▼ 10 pts below district

even with state median · ▼ 9 pts below county median

Grade 865%

School 65% · District 63% · ▲ 2 pts above district

▲ 11 pts above state median · ▲ 3 pts above county median

Science

Grade 515%

School 15% · District 67% · ▼ 52 pts below district

▼ 38 pts below state median · ▼ 51 pts below county median

Grade 861%

School 61% · District 58% · ▲ 3 pts above district

▲ 15 pts above state median · ▲ 8 pts above county median

This schoolSARASOTA, same grade

Graduation rate (ACGR) reflects the federally published Adjusted Cohort Graduation Rate for the most recent year available. We refresh this data annually at the close of each academic year in June. The federal source publishes a banded rate (for example, "90-94%") instead of an exact number for cohorts small enough to risk identifying individual students. The state distribution chart, where shown, plots every school in the state with a published rate or band; schools whose rate is federally suppressed are excluded. Where the federal source publishes a band rather than an exact rate, the school is placed within its band using a stable, ID-derived offset, so its position is consistent across visits.

Proficiency by household income

English language arts

Grade 6Lower-income50%Higher-income40%10 pp gap

Grade 7Lower-income56%Higher-income54%2 pp gap

Grade 8Lower-income75%Higher-income53%22 pp gap

Mathematics

Grade 6Lower-income36%Higher-income30%6 pp gap

Grade 7Lower-income33%Higher-income69%36 pp gap