The Fort Worth Independent School District is in a crisis with regard to academic achievement, a deputy state education commissioner told a crowd of more than 100 parents, teachers and community members during a community meeting Thursday evening.
Most of the speakers at the meeting seemed to agree on that point. But opinions differed widely on what should be done about it.
Steve Lecholop, the Texas Education Agency’s deputy commissioner for governance, spoke at a town hall meeting at Polytechnic High School. The meeting was the second of three community events TEA officials are holding around Fort Worth to take questions from the public about the upcoming state takeover of Fort Worth ISD.
Texas Education Commissioner Mike Morath notified the district’s board last month that he plans to remove its members and replace them with an appointed board of managers. The move comes after a single campus, the Leadership Academy at Forest Oak Sixth Grade, received five straight F ratings, triggering a state law that requires the commissioner to intervene.
TEA officials are taking applications from district residents who are interested in serving on the board. As of last Friday, more than 100 people had submitted applications, Lecholop said, and more than 700 others had started filling out an application but hadn’t completed it.
Morath notified the district Thursday that he planned to move forward with the takeover, despite arguments that board members and district leaders presented at an informal meeting last week. Morath also notified the district that he will appoint Christopher Ruszkowski, the former New Mexico Secretary of Education, as the district’s conservator. In that role, Ruzkowski will oversee turnaround efforts in the district, including directing or possibly overruling actions of the superintendent and other district leaders.
The informal meeting represents the first layer in the appeals process the district is entitled to avail itself of, Lecholop said. The district may also request a formal review by the State Office of Administrative Hearings. District officials haven’t said whether they plan to request such a hearing. In a statement in response to Morath’s letter, Roxanne Martinez, president of the district’s elected board, said the board “will consider all options.”
Several speakers expressed concern that Fort Worth ISD would see the level of teacher and principal turnover that has happened in Houston ISD. Zach Leonard, leader of the advocacy group Families Organized Resisting Takeover, asked whether the TEA would bring Houston Superintendent Mike Miles’ New Education System to Fort Worth. TEA officials have credited the strategy with helping students make big gains on the state test, but students, parents and teachers in Houston have said it relies too much on scripted lessons that leave no room for teachers to tailor their instruction to their students’ needs.
Lecholop said all decisions on curriculum and instruction will come from the state-appointed board and superintendent, once they’re in place. TEA won’t take an active role in decisions about how the district governs itself, he said.
Several speakers also took issue with what they saw as the undemocratic nature of the takeover. Lecholop acknowledged that the key feature of the process is removing a board elected by the community and replacing it with one hand-picked by Morath. Lecholop said the purpose of the appointed board is to “recondition the community as to what an exemplary board looks, acts and sounds like.”
The only current student who spoke during Thursday’s meeting was Jeremiah Taylor, a student at Young Men’s Leadership Academy. Taylor sounded more optimistic about the prospect of state intervention. The district needs help, he said — its state test scores make that obvious. He pointed to the rapid improvement in test scores in Houston ISD, which also has a high concentration of students in low-income families.
“If they’re still able to accomplish that, I think maybe we can,” he said. The final TEA community meeting will be at 6:30 p.m. Nov. 13 at the Fort Worth ISD Administration Building, 7060 Camp Bowie Blvd.