New College of Florida is a public liberal arts college in Sarasota, Florida. The college is a member of the Council of Public Liberal Arts Colleges. In 2023, the state government of Florida overhauled its board of trustees in an attempt to transform the school into a conservative institution. Since then, nearly 40% of faculty have resigned. New College has the smallest student population in the State University System of Florida with 669 students (2022).

Friends of Seagate Inc. was founded in the late 1980s by Kafi Benz as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization in Sarasota, Florida. The historic preservation group lead local efforts protect historic property in the Sarasota-Bradenton area from commercial development. The group later expanded its scope to include environmental conservation. Its most notable project was the preservation of Seagate, the former home of Cincinnati, Ohio, industrialist Powel Crosley Jr. and his wife, Gwendolyn, and its later owners, Mabel and Freeman Horton. In 2002 the organization tried to secure Rus-in- Ur'be, an undeveloped parcel of land in the center of the Indian Beach Sapphire Shores neighborhood, as a local park; however, as of 2014, real estate developers intend to build condominium units at the site.