River City Science Academy has been cleared to build a seventh charter school in Jacksonville, a standalone high school planned for Florida State College at Jacksonville’s Beach Boulevard campus. The tuition-free STEM network has received permit approvals for the project and expects to open the new campus for the 2027-28 academic year.
The approval was reported by Action News Jax, which said RCSA now plans to begin site preparation and cleanup at the FSCJ South Campus location before construction moves forward. The new building is designed to give more RCSA students a direct path to graduation rather than sending them elsewhere for high school, according to the outlet's report.
What The New Campus Will Offer
Per the same report, the planned high school will include Advanced Placement courses, expanded STEM programming, and career and technical education pathways. It's also expected to add early college and dual-enrollment options along with expanded athletics, giving RCSA families a fuller slate of offerings once the doors open.
The new school will sit alongside RCSA's existing footprint on Beach Boulevard, joining a middle-high school already located at 7565 Beach Boulevard, the outlet reported. RCSA also operates an elementary school at 7450 Beach Boulevard, part of a network that traces its Jacksonville roots back to 2007, when the organization opened its first local location.
A Growing Network Across Jacksonville
Beyond the Beach Boulevard corridor, RCSA runs K-8 schools on Baymeadows Way, San Pablo Road, 10911 St. Augustine Road, and 12397 Philips Highway, according to Action News Jax's reporting. RCSA describes itself on its own site as a tuition-free public charter school network built around hands-on STEM learning for students from elementary school through high school.
The network says it now enrolls more than 5,000 students, a figure cited in the Action News Jax report and echoed by RCSA Southeast, which puts the total at approximately 5,000 students across its schools. RCSA Southeast also states that it is open to students living in Duval County or surrounding Florida counties whose families submit a timely application, and the group says its schools have achieved a 100% graduation rate.
Virtual Info Sessions Planned For October
Families interested in the new high school will get a chance to learn more soon: RCSA plans to hold virtual information sessions in October, according to Action News Jax's report. Those sessions are expected to include special programming aimed at eighth-graders and families considering advancing into the new school.
The Beach Boulevard project adds to a broader pattern of new high school construction in the Jacksonville area. Duval County Public Schools has separately described building its own new campus, telling families that construction on that district project was expected to begin in September 2023 with anticipated occupancy by August 2025, and that it would mark the district's first new high school of that effort.
