Panama City Reporter

There were 17,050 white students enrolled in Bay County's only school district in the 2023-24 school year, a 0.8% decrease from the 17,192 white students in the previous school year, according to the Florida Department of Education.

Data showed that Bay County welcomed a total of 27,675 students at the time. Among them, white students comprised 61.6% of the student body to be the most represented ethnicity in the county. They were followed by Black students with a count of 4,027 (14.6%), and Hispanic students, totaling 3,804, or 13.7% of the student population.

Gov. DeSantis has approved an education budget of over $28 billion for the 2024-25 school year. The new budget includes more than $1 billion earmarked exclusively for teacher salaries to better address the teacher shortage the state faces.

According to the National Education Association (NEA), Florida ranks 50th in the U.S. in terms of teacher salaries, only ahead of West Virginia.

District	No. of white Students	Total District Enrollment	% of Total Enrollment
Bay District Schools	17,050	27,675	61.6%