Empowering Education: The Programs of the Pasco Education Foundation

The Pasco Education Foundation (PEF) plays a vital role in enhancing educational opportunities for students and staff within Pasco County Schools. Established in February 1991, the foundation's core mission is to increase community involvement in public schools, channel private sector funding into educational programs, foster innovative teaching approaches, and recognize educational excellence. Through a diverse range of programs and initiatives, the PEF supports students, teachers, and schools, ensuring a brighter future for the entire community.

Supporting Future Leaders: S.T.A.R. Senior Scholarships

The Pasco Education Foundation, with the generous support of its donors, provides S.T.A.R. Senior Scholarships to graduating Pasco County Public Schools seniors. These scholarships help students pursue higher education at universities, community colleges, or technical programs. A single application allows students to be considered for over 150 different scholarships, making the process accessible and efficient. A committee of application reviewers, comprised of donors and committee members, carefully selects scholarship recipients based on established criteria through a competitive process.

The annual distribution of scholarships takes place each May. In 2018, the Pasco Education Foundation, along with dedicated donors, community partners, and local support, awarded over $60,000 in scholarships to graduating seniors.

The Pasco Education Foundation manages all aspects of the scholarship process, making it easy for individuals or trusts to fund a scholarship and support local students. By partnering with the PEF, donors can create a lasting legacy and potentially receive tax benefits. Scholarship recipients typically have one year to claim their funds, and scholarships are generally awarded for one academic year or term, unless otherwise specified.

Recognizing Excellence: Teacher of the Year

The Pasco Education Foundation proudly celebrates outstanding educators through the annual S.T.A.R. Awards. These awards honor district winners and Teacher of the Year finalists. In 2026, Anastacia Kelley was recognized as Pasco County Teacher of the Year. The S.T.A.R. Awards ceremony brings together the stars of Pasco County Schools to celebrate excellence in education.

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Providing Essential Resources: Wise Supplies

Wise Supplies is a free teacher supply center for Pasco County Schools educators. Thanks to generous monetary and supply donations, Wise Supplies helps teachers and students have the supplies they need to succeed. The program relies on the support of community partners, who often organize summer supply drives to collect essential items. Donations can be dropped off at designated locations throughout Pasco County.

Mentoring for Success: Take Stock in Children

Since 1997, Take Stock in Children Pasco County has partnered with Pasco County Schools to provide a unique opportunity for deserving low-income youth/students, many from minority families, to escape the cycle of poverty through education. This comprehensive program offers college scholarships, caring volunteer mentors, and hope for a better life. Donor contributions are matched dollar-for-dollar by the Florida Prepaid Foundation, doubling the impact of every donation.

Mentors play a crucial role in the success of Take Stock in Children. The program actively recruits mentors from the community who are willing to make a lasting impact on the lives of students.

Investing in STEM Education: Building Pathways

The Pasco Education Foundation is committed to fostering STEM education in Pasco County Schools. A grant from Duke Energy, matched by the PEF, supports the "Building Pathways: Energy, Engineering, and Opportunity in Pasco Classrooms" initiative. This program empowers educators and sparks student interest in energy, engineering, and robotics across 42 schools, many of which are Title I.

The Foundation also supports a new STEM lab at the Energy and Marine Science Center (EMC), as well as the PEACE Camp over the summer. The EMC, located on the Salt Springs Run Estuary in Port Richey, provides students with firsthand experience studying coastal ecology, wetlands, marshlands, and estuarine environments. All elementary students visit the Energy and Marine Center to study the importance of the marine and estuarine environments first hand.

Furthermore, the robotics teams at Kirkland Ranch Academy of Innovation, River Ridge High School, and Wendell Krinn Technical High School are becoming our next-generation science and technology leaders. These student groups build high-level robots throughout the year and bring them to international competitions.

Wendell Krinn Technical High School’s trade programs like robotics, electrical, commercial arts, and auto mechanics are all coming together to build an Aquaponics Farming System, featuring multiple fish tanks, a clarifier and biofilter, flood trays, and grow towers. Located adjacent to the high school cafeteria where the entire student body can view it daily, having an aquaponics system at the school will be invaluable to all of the core subjects for years to come.

Promoting Literacy: New Worlds Reading Initiative

The Pasco Education Foundation partners with the New Worlds Reading Initiative to provide Parent Engagement Nights. These events are designed to give parents and caregivers practical strategies to support their children’s reading development. In the 2024/25 school year, more than 200 students and their family members participated in these impactful events. The Pasco Education Foundation believes that parent involvement is one of the most powerful tools in fostering strong literacy skills and a lifelong love of reading. Pasco families are gaining both the confidence and the resources to make reading a joyful, everyday experience at home.

Creating Career Pathways: Patient Care Technician Programs

The Pasco Education Foundation and the HCA Healthcare Foundation are collaborating to create career pathways for students to grow our Patient Care Technician CTAE Programs.

Supporting Summer Learning: Extreme Summer Challenge

The Pasco Education Foundation supports Pasco County Schools’ Extreme Summer Challenge. Each summer current PK-11th grade students are invited to participate in a fun, self-paced program running from late May to early July-designed to boost literacy and math skills.

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Fostering Leadership: The Leader In Me Program

The Leader In Me program works on transforming school culture, starting with educators, students, and families. The school staff participates in professional development, learning about incorporating the habits into their personal and professional lives and then teaching the students to do the same. Teachers use the Leader in Me curriculum to teach leadership skills, build social-emotional learning capacity, and learn how to problem-solve with peers. As part of this growth, Fox Hollow established a Culture Crew that focused on building culture through schoolwide projects to beautify the school (painting, hanging up signs, cleaning, etc.) and team-building activities to foster and grow relationships with teachers and students.

Encouraging Innovation: Innovative Classroom Projects

One major initiative of the Foundation is our “Innovative Classroom Projects” program. Each year teachers apply for support of creative, innovative, rigorous, and relevant teaching/learning opportunities in their classrooms. Hundreds of teachers and, subsequently, thousands of students are impacted by these grants.

Supporting Staff Development: Employee Scholarships and Teacher Leadership Academy

The Pasco Education Foundation believes we must support efforts to retain our schools' best and brightest staff members. Our Pasco County Schools Employee Scholarship program provides financial assistance to employees who want to further their education to better serve the needs of our students.

The Teacher Leadership Academy is an innovative model of teacher leader preparation to drive the curriculum for advanced credentials taught by a team of school district personnel and award-winning University of South Florida faculty. This partnership is leading the country in innovative collaboration that transforms teacher professional learning, USF graduate education, and teacher turnover. Recruiting and retaining high-quality teachers has become a top priority.

Engaging Students in Science: Student Spaceflight Experiments Program

The Student Spaceflight Experiments Program allowed students to design and propose real science experiments to be conducted by astronauts on the International Space Station. Students designed experiments in diverse fields, including seed germination, physiology and life cycles of microorganisms (e.g. bacteria), cell biology and growth, food studies, and studies of micro-aquatic life. Students also had the opportunity to design a Mission patch that went to the Space Station, and then returned with an embossed certification stating that it flew in space.

Contributing to the PEF Mission

There are several ways to contribute to the PEF mission. The organization is administered by a board of directors which is responsible for planning, fundraising, resource allocation and scheduling of PEF events. The PEF Board has set bold financial goals to support the standard of excellence for Pasco School District students.

Pasco County Schools employees can contribute through payroll donations.

The PEF is a charitable non-profit 501 (c)(3) organization, all donations are tax deductible. Many committed individuals, businesses, and organizations have contributed time and money to support the Pasco Education Foundation, enabling us to disburse nearly $1,000,000 each year to fund creative teaching grants, scholarships, awards, program support, staff development, and educational materials to the students and staff of Pasco County Schools.

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