Children eat lunch in the cafeteria at Andrews Elementary School in 2024. Austin students deserve a strong education with teachers treated as professionals, U.S. Rep. Lloyd Doggett writes.
Mikala Compton/American-Statesman
Back-to-school excitement has filled our schools with laughter and learning: classmates reuniting, new backpacks and school supplies, extra efforts by devoted teachers. Long ago when my wife, Libby, was teaching at Ortega Elementary, I remember her excitement every new school year as we took another pickup truck load of materials for her first-graders.
Yet this year, we have a rocky beginning. With school closures, boundary changes, more limited bus routes and other disruptions, our Austin school district trustees have been subject to constant criticism. While their decisions may not be perfect, that criticism is largely misdirected. Their distasteful task has been to allocate the pain of Gov. Greg Abbott’s harmful policies over which they have almost no control.
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The governor was so committed to shifting taxpayer funds to private academies that he spent millions in defeating the few Republican legislators who opposed his misguided voucher plan. The remaining Republicans dutifully followed his direction in repeatedly underfunding our public schools, while simultaneously imposing more and more mandates about how and what is taught. Our schools have faced years of state neglect, budget shortfalls and campuses that have struggled far too long.
State takeover is the latest weapon with which these politicians are assaulting our local schools more aggressively than almost any place in America. Abbott’s allies act as judge, jury and executioner — setting narrow standards based on test scores, deciding whether performance is adequate, and terminating local control when desired.
RELATED: Austin ISD needs targeted intervention, not a state takeover
Since he appoints the education commissioner, the governor has significant power over what happens here and in other school districts. Ironically, on the very day a long-awaited state audit faulted his own Texas Education Agency for a “management-heavy structure” that violates state law, the governor criticized the administration of Austin ISD, while taking no public action on TEA.
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According to data provided through a public records request, Houston ISD has lost a total of about 12,000 teachers since the state takeover in 2023, with roughly a third of the educators leaving each year. Many have been replaced with inexperienced hires. Nearly one in four is now uncertified. Libraries have been shuttered; 12 campuses have been closed. Enrollment has fallen by about 15,000 students. That’s not a model for Austin, but a warning.
Even by the state’s narrow STAAR measure, Austin is improving — just receiving an overall district B-rating, with the number of A- and B-rated campuses climbing from 43 to 61 over the past two years. That progress is being seen in neighborhoods throughout our district, including many schools responsible for large numbers of children with the greatest needs.
Though two of the 114 Austin ISD schools have been F-rated far too many times, the state just changed its rules to limit an acceptable remedy. We must do far better by our children. But replacing control by locally-elected school trustees with an unelected ally of the governor is no way to accomplish that.
ALSO READ: Dear Gov. Abbott: School districts like Marble Falls need teachers on H-1B visas
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Our problems will not be solved by taking Austin’s schools away from Austin. Our students deserve a strong education with teachers treated as professionals. And the accountability system that punishes districts, which the state has starved, must be changed.
Fortunately, parents, teachers, students and community organizations across Austin are coming together against a destructive state takeover through a new organization, Keep Austin Schools Independent (JoinKASI.org). Libby and I have joined, and we hope you will, too.
While arbitrary school ratings and any takeover decision can be appealed, the better approach is for the education commissioner to consider additional evidence, which Austin ISD has submitted, and approve a partnership agreement. Other districts have reached similar agreements. This would allow more time and resources to improve our two underperforming campuses.
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Meanwhile, we Austinites should make clear that more state political interference, denying local control, will only weaken our ability to strengthen our schools in providing quality educational opportunities for all. Let them hear us!
U.S. Rep. Lloyd Doggett, a Democrat from Austin, has served in Congress since 1995.