AUSTIN, Texas — After weeks of emotional meetings and families pleading to save their schools, Austin ISD has released a revised draft of its proposed consolidation plan. Despite the pushback, the district is still planning to close 13 schools.

Austin ISD leaders say the updated draft reflects community feedback gathered over the last several weeks, with changes made clear and marked in red.

“This is our updated draft plan. It’s still a draft,” Superintendent Matias Segura said.

Families are now getting a look at the changes made after more than 50 district experts received and reviewed more than 7,000 community comments.

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According to the district, the most common topic was boundaries, which accounted for 45.6% of submissions. Other popular topics included school closures (17.9%), school-wide dual language (10.1%), transition plans (4.9%), and transfer policies (3.6%).

Segura said one of the biggest clarifications in the new draft is that students enrolled in existing programs will be guaranteed a spot if that program moves to another campus.

“We made it really, really clear in our documents that if you are part of an existing program and that program moves, we are going to guarantee your placement,” Segura said. “That wasn’t clearly articulated in the previous draft; that’s because we weren’t sure if we could make it all work.”

The district is also updating its transfer policies for rising 6th and 9th graders to give more flexibility to families affected by zoning changes.

“If you’re a middle school student and you’re in your 8th grade year and you’ve been planning on this high school, we wanted to ensure that you still had access to that high school,” Segura said.

Another change includes automatically approving sibling transfer requests so families can stay together at the same school.

Still, one major piece of the plan remains unchanged — the list of 13 schools slated for closure:

Barrington ESBecker ESBedichek MSBryker Woods ESDawson ESMaplewood ESMartin MSOak Springs ESPalm ESRidgetop ESSunset Valley ESWidén ESWinn Montessori

Austin ISD will hold two virtual open houses for families to ask questions about the revised plan on November 5 and November 8. A final vote from the school board is expected on November 20.