A Texas state representative called for shelving the troubled State of Texas Assessment of Academic Readiness (STAAR) to “iron out” its “many kinks” and, instead, choose “from a variety of nationally normed standardized tests.” The only problem is those proposed tests are aligned to the Common Core State Standards, which Texas rejected.
Newly released findings in an independent audit of the Houston Independent School District reveal why a $1.9 billion bond program approved by voters in 2012 came up $211 million short.
Texas public and charter school students barely got settled into their new classrooms Monday when three new cases of teacher-student sexual misconduct emerged.
The price tag of one Texas school district’s high school football stadium and events center just ballooned to $70 million, making it, reportedly, the most expensive high school football complex in the United States.
More Texas parents said “no” to vaccinating their children in the 2015-2016 school year based on reasons of conscience, according to the Annual Report of Immunization Status from the Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS).
The days of “no pass, no play” are no more. These days, some schools dump “D” grades to allow high school athletes to play sports. One Texas school district says they signed onto this brave new world where “D” is the new “C”, to level the playing field.
The Houston Independent School District board of trustees voted Thursday evening to approve spending nearly $1.25 million taxpayer dollars to rename eight schools with politically correct monikers that erase all traces of their historical Confederate ties.
Outraged taxpayers, parents, alumni, and community watchdog groups held a press conference at the Houston Independent School District offices Wednesday to protest the school board’s plans to spend millions in taxpayer dollars to rename eight schools. They feel the money would be better spent on the students.
The 24-year-old Texas teacher best known for allegedly getting pregnant by her 13-year-old student was back in court Wednesday for violating a condition of her bond agreement. Prosecutors pointed out it was not her first violation and asked the judge to revoke her bond. Instead, he decided to allow her to remain free on a so-called “zero tolerance” policy.
The Texas Commission on Next Generation Assessments and Accountability, a 15-member team of appointees assembled for the sole purpose of recommending changes to student testing and public school accountability, stopped just short of suggesting the state scrap its year-end State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness (STAAR) and replace them with Common Core style exams.
Another Texas administrator stands accused of stealing money from a school district. The administrator also faces felony charges for alleged money laundering and the misuse of school property.
Stand for Fort Worth (SFFW), an anti-transgender policy group, says the Fort Worth Independent School District is trying to silence the voices of those who oppose the new Transgender Student Guidelines.
The “fuzzy facts” offered by a Texas State Board of Education candidate have been raising the eyebrows of many in this Texas primary run-off race.
Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick stated emphatically that the Lone Star State “will not yield to blackmail from the President of the United States,” in response to new guidelines released Friday from the U.S. Department of Education and the U.S.
Controversy erupted at the cash-strapped Houston Independent School District Thursday when the board of trustees voted to change the names of seven of its schools originally named for Confederate war figures. At issue is how trustees handled the process, which left many Houstonians feeling disenfranchised and worried about the astronomical costs associated with the name changes. Some may sue.
The sixth former El Paso ISD educator allegedly involved in a massive test score fraud scheme surrendered to federal agents and is being held without bail.
School district officials investigate a bevy of brawls that broke out at a Texas all-girls academy this week, discovered because the cellphone shot videos of them were prominently posted on social media as part of a happening called “Beat Week.”
Gov. Greg Abbott tapped longtime Dallas Independent School District Board of Trustee Mike Morath as the state’s next Education Commissioner to oversee the Texas Education Agency (TEA) for the state’s 1,200 school districts and charters, a decision already receiving mixed reviews.
Top Texas officials named 11 of 15 appointees to the newly created public education Commission on Next Generation Assessments and Accountability, authorized through the passage of House Bill 2804 during the 84th legislative session. The short-term 15-member commission’s sole purpose is to write a report that develops and makes recommendations “for new systems of student assessment and public school accountability” which is due by September 1, 2016.
A Texas school district apologized in a letter late Tuesday to its junior high school community after a 7th grade student voiced concerns that a classroom activity questioned the existence of God.
The Dallas Independent School District (ISD) Board of Trustees approved Dr. Michael Hinojosa, 59, as superintendent of schools in a 6-to-1 vote on Tuesday night.
Council of American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) Dallas-Fort Worth director Alia Salem said that is Ahmed Mohamed’s name was “Jimmy,” school district officials in Irving, Texas, would not have jumped to the conclusion that his clock project was a bomb hoax.
A 14-year-old North Texas high school freshman says school officials overreacted when they called police after thinking his elaborate digital homemade clock invention was a hoax bomb but the Council of American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) also stepped in with a little overreacting of their own, alleging the incident as Islamophobia.
Longtime Houston Independent School District (ISD) Superintendent, Dr. Terry Grier, unexpectedly announced his resignation effective March 1.
The latest high school girl cat fight broke out in a Texas high school on Wednesday and landed one of the girls in jail. The three-girl tussle came within a week of a four female fracas caught on cellphone, only this incident ended with one arrest and an injured school police officer.
A Texas high school brawl was captured on a cellphone. Back-to-school means back-to-brawling for some out-of- control Texas teenagers at one high school. On the second week of the new school year, double dramatic slugfests were caught on one student’s cellphone and even were called “just another fight.” Meanwhile, the violent video made local news coverage, got picked up by sister stations in other TV markets, and landed on Yahoo News!, but no arrests were made.
A West Texas biology teacher who was accused of being drunk at school and was subsequently arrested at school for public intoxication has now resigned from her post. School was barely back in session from the time the inebriated educator was taken into custody to when she turned in her resignation letter.
Three women believed to be drunk got on a Texas public school bus at a regular stop and rode with the students all the way to their middle school last Friday. No one, not even the bus driver, realized that three allegedly heavily intoxicated 20-something women were on the bus until they arrived at Harris Middle School in San Antonio.
The Texas Supreme Court heard opposing arguments in the much anticipated showdown between the state and 600-plus public school districts over public education finance reform on Monday.
The Texas law that decriminalizes truancy and changes how public school districts handle unexcused absences goes into effect on September 1. During the 2015 Legislative session, state lawmakers passed House Bill 2398, which redressed the Failure to Attend School (FTAS) from criminal status to a civil offense called “truant conduct” under the family code.
“On Wisconsin” replaced a Texas high school’s long-held”Dixie” fight song, a Southern favorite often associated with the Confederate South, but “Dixie” may come back when students vote on a new school spirit song.
A 7th grade Texas middle school assignment that went viral on social media this week was determined to be fake. The storyline generated about students taking an allegedly invasive student survey was not true — it did not happen.
Texas is faced with the dilemma of more teachers accused of sexual misconduct with their students. This casts a dark shadow over the classroom as kids head back-to-school.
A Dallas area school bus driver beaten by 7th and 8th grade students is finally speaking out. The assault was captured on surveillance a video that has surfaced from last February. The driver is now, asking officials to press criminal charges and he has hired an attorney.
The vote on a controversial proposed LGBT anti-discrimination policy change to a North Texas school district’s existing policy was postponed Thursday night.
Texas House leadership squashed education reform legislation that would have sped up the time to “repurpose” chronically failing public schools during the recent 84th Legislature. Instead, they aggressively pushed for progressive community schools.
The Texas Education Agency (TEA) announced its statewide public education accountability ratings. Although favorable, showing most school districts and charters fared well, these results were compiled using changed criteria and relying on less reported information.
The latest high school graduation rates for Texas tell a good story of record-breaking rates. However, they may not tell the future story given new graduation requirements.
Under a new “reverse transfer” program, two million students could be eligible to retroactively receive associate’s degrees. Community colleges are a pathway into four-year universities but it seems many students transfer from two-year to four-year institutions without first completing their associate’s degrees.
It was a huge blunder for the Houston Independent School District (ISD), the seventh largest district in the nation and the largest in Texas when an adminstrator’s letter threatened parents that their children would face summer school if they opted out of the annual state-mandated State of Texas Assessment of Academic Readiness (STAAR) exam. The next day, that threat was downgraded to an editing error.
