The Success Academy network, a nonprofit organization based in New York, will open elementary school classrooms within five public schools in Miami-Dade starting next school year, two of which will be in Hialeah, according to reported NBC6.
The selected schools are Westland Hialeah Senior High, Hialeah-Miami Lakes Senior High, Homestead Senior High, North Miami Senior High, and Miami Jackson Senior High.
The measure is made possible by a state co-location policy that requires districts with schools of low enrollment to allocate space to authorized charter operators.
In Westland Hialeah, the adaptation work has already begun: one wing of the building is being transformed with bright colors and furniture for the youngest children, and the school library has been converted into classrooms to make room for the new school.
The first year will only offer kindergarten and first grade, with gradual expansion up to fifth grade.
Maleena Guandique, the appointed director for Success Academy Westland Hialeah, wanted to reassure parents about the coexistence with high school students: "I want parents to know that their children will be completely separated from the high school students; we will have different lunch schedules and will be in different spaces."
Guandique also highlighted the pedagogical approach of the network: "We focus a lot on chess. It teaches our students to be strategic, to anticipate their opponent, and to have confidence in their decisions."
What does Success Academy offer to families?
The charter includes free uniforms, after-school care at no charge every day until 5:20 p.m., and English instruction for those who need it.
Registration is now open. For kindergarten, children must turn five before September 1, 2027. Admission will be determined by a random drawing scheduled for January 12, 2027.
Interested families can contact Success Academy Florida at florida@successacademies.org or call (786) 673-0380.
The controversy: 700 dollars per student and the union on the warpath
Success Academy will pay the district 700 dollars per student to cover maintenance, cleaning, and other shared costs.
Antonio White, president of the United Teachers of Dade (UTD) union, rejected that amount: "That doesn't even come close to the actual cost of operating a school."
White went further and described the agreement as a "Tallahassee gift" to a competing system: "It's like putting the fox in the henhouse. You place them inside traditional public schools, essentially at the taxpayer's expense; we are operating two distinct systems in the same place, and only one of them is paying."
The superintendent Rafael Villalobos confidently responded to the district's offer: "I have to make sure that we have the best product, and while I know that is the case, we need to go out and let the parents see it too."
The context: Miami-Dade loses thousands of students
The arrival of Success Academy comes at a critical moment for the district. Miami-Dade began the 2026-2027 school year with 215,078 students, down from 230,172 the previous year, a decline of more than 15,000 students in just one year and about 31,000 enrollments over two years.
Part of this loss can be attributed to the drastic decline in immigrant students: from over 22,000 new students born abroad in the 2022-2023 school year to just about 3,000 in the period leading up to 2026, many of whom are Cubans concentrated specifically in Hialeah.
On that same Thursday, the district identified five additional schools that could close, although the final vote was postponed to March 2027. Broward, for its part, is experiencing its fifth consecutive year of decline and is considering closing another 10 campuses, with a vote scheduled for December, as reported by WSVN.
The Miami-Dade School Board approved the co-location plan in April 2026 and ratified a five-year performance contract in October, from July 1, 2027, to June 30, 2032, with a maximum authorized capacity of 3,990 students across the five centers and an initial enrollment expected to be approximately 1,400 students.
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