Swedish construction firm to rebuild Tampa school in $77M project

Skanska, the Swedish construction firm with a local office, will begin demolition and reconstruction of a Stewart Middle Magnet School in Tampa this month.

The $77 million project will create a shared campus for Stewart and the neighboring Just Elementary. According to the firm, when finished there will be nearly 135,000 square feet of educational space.

The Stewart portion of the campus will have more than 1,000 student stations and Just Elementary will house about 530 students, Skanska says in a statement. The two schools will share a cafeteria and media center on the property. A gym at the original Stewart Middle will remain with new lighting and code upgrades.

Work, Skanska says, is expected to be completed in early 2028.

In a letter to parents in early January, Hillsborough County Public Schools told parents the middle school is being transformed “into a state-of-the-art STEM school” and students would relocate to Just Jan. 26.

Stewart is on Spruce Street near the Hillsborough River, on the opposite bank from Armature Works near the city’s downtown.

Skanska Group is one largest construction and project development companies in the world with 2024 revenue totaling 177 billion in Swedish Krona (currently about $19.8 billion).

Skanska USA was founded in 1971 and employs more than 6,300. Its revenue in 2024 was $8.2 billion. It has 28 offices nationwide, including in Tampa, Orlando and Fort Lauderdale.

Among its local projects are the St. Petersburg Pier; Coachman Park in downtown Clearwater; the University of South Florida Health’s Morsani College of Medicine & Heart Institute at Water Street Tampa; and the renovation and expansion of the Tampa Convention Center.

It has also worked on projects for Hillsborough schools in the past, including on the $47 million campus conversion of Collins PK-8 in Riverview and a $12 million upgrade to Chamberlain High School’s athletic complex.