Leopard Families,
Our Lutz staff is excited to welcome our leopard students back for the 2026-2027 school year! We hope this letter finds your family safe and excited about the new school year. We also hope all our families have had a restful and relaxing summer break! Our 2026-2027 school theme is Peace, Love, and Leopard Pride! It will be amazing to see all returning leopard students and those new to the Lutz K-8 family. We also look forward to welcoming our new Pre-K and Kindergarten students to the Lutz Leopard family. We have been closed for construction for new floors and cabinets and are excited to reenter the campus to prepare for learning beginning August 10th.
Our faculty and staff are ready to welcome our leopards back and begin the school year focused on the success and growth of every student at Lutz K-8 after a summer of construction. We appreciate your patience and understanding as we reopen this year after a summer closure but are excited for the enhancements of new floors and cabinets. We are excited to announce that Lutz K-8 School will maintain its “A” rating for the school year! We want to thank our leopard students, families, staff, and community for their dedication and grit towards success throughout the 2025-2026 school year. This is exciting news for our school community, and we look forward to continuing to provide the best educational opportunities to students here at Lutz K-8 School. With this great news we will ensure we continue to focus on rigorous academic instruction to support the whole child in our classrooms. We want to ensure we fulfill our vision of helping students learn today to lead tomorrow. We look forward to seeing all Lutz families at meet the teacher on 8/6/26 from 4:00 P.M.-6:00 P.M. Our meet the teacher open house will be broken up this year as the first 30 minutes of open house will be solely dedicated to curriculum and learning expectations for the year. Information on homeroom teacher assignments will be available in the FOCUS portal for this beginning August 4th. Please reference the flyer posted on social media and sent out for more information on ensuring you have a FOCUS parent account created. The information in FOCUS will replace the traditional email sent to families. If you need assistance, please call the front office.
Lutz will continue to provide communication to families via parent links, texts, and website updates. Please ensure that your information is current with the front office. In addition, parents are encouraged to maintain a Canvas account for students in upper grades to track grades and assignments. Please see below for school opening reminders and essential information. You are welcome to call our office at 813-949-1452 for any questions you may have.
* Arrival for all students is 7:10 A.M. School begins at 7:40 A.M. for all students.
*The first day of school for students is Monday, August 10th. This is an early release day and dismissal is at 1:10 P.M.
* Dismissal for Grades Pre-K-8 is 2:10 P.M. Tuesday through Friday. We encourage our families with middle school students to arrive after 2:17 P.M. to assist with traffic flow. Upon exiting Lutz K-8 during arrival or dismissal, please only turn right onto U.S. 41. This will assist with traffic flow and prevent traffic back-ups into the dismissal locations.
* Meet the Teacher Night is scheduled for Thursday, August 6th from 4:00 P.M.-6:00 P.M.
* Lutz K-8 has a mandatory uniform policy. Students should always be in uniform (see website for more details). Please reference the uniform and cell phone policy on our website. Uniform and cell phone information will be available for students at open house and in students’ first day packets.
The Lutz K-8 faculty and staff are excited to welcome our students and families back as we continue to grow and learn together this school year!
Respectfully,
Joshua Phillips
Principal