The Five Star School Award was created by the Commissioner's Community Involvement Council and is presented annually to those schools that have shown evidence of exemplary community involvement, which plays a vital role in the success of our schools and our students´ ability to learn, dream and achieve. Both the letter and spirit of the school improvement and accountability legislation are built upon the active involvement of parents, guardians, business people, and other community members in efforts to improve Florida's schools. In order to earn Five STAR School recognition, a school must show documentation that it has achieved 100% of the established criteria in the categories of:

• a school must have double the number of volunteer hours compared to the number of students enrolled,
• achieve 100 percent of the criteria in each of the five categories of Business Partnerships, Family Involvement, Volunteers, Student Community Service, and School Advisory Councils, as defined by the Florida Department of Education.
• have a school grade of “C” or above,
• also have a portfolio that documents the achievement of each criterion.