Fort Worth ISD is moving teachers from under-enrolled schools to ones dealing with overcrowded classrooms. The goal: Put teachers where the students are.<\/p>\n
The district announced the move Monday on its in-house newscast<\/a>, 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.<\/p>\n 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.<\/p>\n \u201cIf I have to find more resources for that classroom while I\u2019m spending double-digit resources over here for a lot less kids, that\u2019s bad management of money,\u201d Licata said. \u201cThere has to be a transfer of resources, and it\u2019s a hard decision.\u201d<\/p>\n FWISD built its current budget around the enrollment projection of 63,068 students<\/a>. Districtwide enrollment is down, but the decline is uneven across schools.<\/p>\n Affected teachers will stay within their school\u2019s 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.\u00a0<\/p>\n 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.<\/p>\n Shifting teachers ensures they are in the classrooms where students showed up, Soliz said.<\/p>\n \u201cWe want this to be as minimally disruptive to our students, of course, and to our teaching staff,\u201d Soliz said.<\/p>\n Licata and Soliz discussed the process during a district-produced recorded interview touted as \u201cfull, unedited\u201d in the news release that included a link to it. Affected teachers will be notified by Sept. 7, Soliz said in the video.<\/p>\n 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\u2019 classrooms are not yet finalized.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m trying to wrap my head around \u2014 some of my students are still moving their schedules, which means some of our teachers don\u2019t really have their final classroom counts,\u201d Wheeler told Licata.<\/p>\n The superintendent said the process is about each school\u2019s total enrollment, not individual classroom counts. He agreed the timing was a problem and moving teachers should have occurred before the school year began.<\/p>\n \u201cThe fact that we\u2019re doing this the third week of school pisses me off,\u201d Licata said.<\/p>\n Jacob Sanchez is education editor for the Fort Worth Report. Contact him at jacob.sanchez@fortworthreport.org<\/a> or @_jacob_sanchez<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n 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\u2019s 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<\/a>.<\/p>\n This <a target=”_blank” href=”https:\/\/fortworthreport.org\/2026\/08\/26\/fort-worth-isds-uneven-enrollment-prompts-shuffling-of-teachers-to-balance-class-sizes\/”>article<\/a> first appeared on <a target=”_blank” href=”https:\/\/fortworthreport.org”>Fort Worth Report<\/a> and is republished here under a <a target=”_blank” href=”https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-nd\/4.0\/”>Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License<\/a>.<img src=”https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/fortworthreport.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/cropped-favicon.png?resize=150%2C150&ssl=1″ style=”width:1em;height:1em;margin-left:10px;”><\/p>\n <img id=”republication-tracker-tool-source” src=”https:\/\/fortworthreport.org\/?republication-pixel=true&post=750913&ga4=2820184429″ style=”width:1px;height:1px;”><script> PARSELY = { autotrack: false, onload: function() { PARSELY.beacon.trackPageView({ url: “https:\/\/fortworthreport.org\/2026\/08\/26\/fort-worth-isds-uneven-enrollment-prompts-shuffling-of-teachers-to-balance-class-sizes\/”, urlref: window.location.href }); } } <\/script> <script id=”parsely-cfg” src=”\/\/cdn.parsely.com\/keys\/fortworthreport.org\/p.js”><\/script>