Fort Worth ISD is moving teachers from under-enrolled schools to ones dealing with overcrowded classrooms. The goal: Put teachers where the students are.
The district announced the move Monday on its in-house newscast, and Superintendent Peter Licata discussed it that evening at a listening session at South Hills High School. Districtwide enrollment is 2,500 students below projections, according to a Tuesday news release.
Licata told parents Monday evening that he sees the process as steering resources toward the schools that need them most. For example, he said Benbrook Middle-High School is up 200 students while another high school is down 150.
“If I have to find more resources for that classroom while I’m spending double-digit resources over here for a lot less kids, that’s bad management of money,” Licata said. “There has to be a transfer of resources, and it’s a hard decision.”
FWISD built its current budget around the enrollment projection of 63,068 students. Districtwide enrollment is down, but the decline is uneven across schools.
Affected teachers will stay within their school’s region and administrators will try to keep them in the same grade level and subject, Licata said. District leaders are working with principals as they move teachers.
Daniel Soliz, chief of schools and deputy superintendent, told parents FWISD has enough teachers. Licata estimated the district has 20-25 teachers on the bench.
Shifting teachers ensures they are in the classrooms where students showed up, Soliz said.
“We want this to be as minimally disruptive to our students, of course, and to our teaching staff,” Soliz said.
Licata and Soliz discussed the process during a district-produced recorded interview touted as “full, unedited” in the news release that included a link to it. Affected teachers will be notified by Sept. 7, Soliz said in the video.
At the listening session, FWISD educator Randi Wheeler said the teacher reapportionment is hitting in the third week of school when some students are still changing schedules and teachers’ classrooms are not yet finalized.
“I’m trying to wrap my head around — some of my students are still moving their schedules, which means some of our teachers don’t really have their final classroom counts,” Wheeler told Licata.
The superintendent said the process is about each school’s total enrollment, not individual classroom counts. He agreed the timing was a problem and moving teachers should have occurred before the school year began.
“The fact that we’re doing this the third week of school pisses me off,” Licata said.
Jacob Sanchez is education editor for the Fort Worth Report. Contact him at jacob.sanchez@fortworthreport.org or @_jacob_sanchez.
Disclosure: FWISD manager Pete Geren leads the Sid W. Richardson Foundation, a financial supporter of the Fort Worth Report. FWISD manager Laurie George is a member of the Report’s reader advisory council. At the Fort Worth Report, news decisions are made independently of our board members and financial supporters. Read more about our editorial independence policy here.
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