Good evening. The meeting is now convened at 05:04, PM. I'd like like to ask everyone to please silence your cell phones. A quorum of the board members, is present at the in the auditorium tonight. They are from my right on the platform. Cassandra Ozan Bandy, Michelle Cruz Arnold, Jeanette Garza Linder, Angela Lawn Flowers, myself, Rick Campo, Audrey Mona Manayi, we have Rolando Martinez, Paula Mendoza, and Adam Revant. And and, Audrey, I'll get your name right someday. I'm going to send you a pen at all.
I haven't. Okay. Alright. We have we have some elected officials, here. Savant Moore, trustee, thank you for being here. Anybody else? Okay. We'll now be joined by a member of the junior, reserve officers training corp to lead our pledges. I would like to ask the board, president or board vice president Audrey Momonani. Momonani Aidan. Don't worry about it. I can't do it. It's it's it's crazy. Okay. And and to introduce our leader tonight. Hello. Cadet captain Amber Luna serves as the battalion commander for Bel Air High School's twentieth
Cardinal Army JROTC battalion. She has distinguished herself in academics, leadership, and community service throughout her high school years. Cadet Luna serves on the school's cardinal leadership crew and has volunteered hundreds of hours serving her school and her community in events such as helping plan a special education field day and teaching first aid to fifth grade students. Cadet Luna is the commander of the unarmed drill team, commander of the marksmanship team, a member of the archery team, and a member of the Raider team that recently competed in the national Raider competition
in Fort Knox, Kentucky. After graduation, cadet Luna will attend my alma mater, Texas A and M University, where she will major in telecommunications and join the Air Force ROTC program to receive her commission as an Air Force officer after college. Cadet Luna, congratulations. Go ahead. Please rise for a moment of silent meditation. Please remain standing for the pledge of allegiance and the pledge of the Texas flag. I pledge allegiance to the flag of The United States Of America, and to the Republic for which it stands,
one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Honor the Texas flag, I pledge allegiance to the Texas, one state under God, one and indivisible. Thank you, cadet Luna. Appreciate it. Good luck at Texas A and M. At each February board meeting, we have the pleasure of featuring the student who won the annual Martin Luther King Junior Oratory Competition. HISD would like to thank, Foley and and, Lardner LLP, for supporting this competition, now in its twenty ninth year in Houston.
We are proud, to celebrate, Montoya Murphy Murray, a fifth grade student at Blackshear Elementary. She made history as a first repeat winner of the competition, and won first place with her powerful speech honoring doctor King's legacy and and reminding us of all the importance of justice, peace, and equality. Now I'd like to ask the go ahead. Are you I'd like to ask the principal of Blackshear Elementary to come up, to the microphone and introduce herself. And, Montoya, thanks. I'm Josiah Brown,
proud principal of Blackshear Elementary School, and good evening to everybody at home and in the room. We appreciate you for being here. I'm honored to introduce to you an incredible girl who happens to be a Blackshear Lion Club, where the pride of third war begins. Miss Montoya Murray is the one and only back to back 2024 and 2025 Foley MLK order winner. She is an icon on campus. Montoya is the cheerleader. She is a safety patrol leader. She is also a b honor roll student and perfect attendance winner for this school year so far.
Woah. Montoya is a ferocious reader and writer that thrives under the guidance of her parents and our librarian, miss Rhonda Eaglin. So Montoya plans to take her talents to Marla and PVA next school year. We're gonna miss her. She's gonna grow into a poet like Maya Angelou and a singer like Whitney Houston. Please honor us, and please give a round of applause for Montoya Murillo. Good evening. America. America. America. We stand today in a nation saturated with ideals of freedom and how far we have come from segregation to integration,
from racism in the neighborhood to living as a brotherhood. Yes. God has blessed America. However, doctor King acknowledged in his speech to other America. The reality is there are two Americas. One flourishing with prosperity, the other plagued by poverty and inequality. The question was asked, which would doctor King tell us about our responsibilities as citizens and leaders in America today? Doctor King would remind us that our responsibility is to keep America's heartbeat strong and in harmony with God,
to create the society rooted in equality. Let me share a moment from my own life that brings this idea to life. When I was a little girl in 2019, at the end of my kindergarten year, we performed sing a song by Earth, Wind, and Fire. The message was simple. If you're down and out, sing a song, and it'll make your day. At that time, America's heartbeat was steady. Then COVID nineteen struck. The nation's heartbeats riced with panic as over one point two million lives were lost
and the rhythm of America weakened, sending us to our knees crying, God, please bless America. Doctor King, a drum major for justice, kept the rhythm of the hearts beats of America alive. He would tell us the impact of COVID nineteen caused severe damage to our country, and our nation's heartspeeds lost the rhythm, causing us to need bypass surgery. In our democracy, we must stay bypass surgery. In our democracy, we must stabilize the hearts beat of our nation. But shortly after the start of COVID,
America chose to bypass justice after the murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and Ahmaud Arbery on January 6 at the insurrection. We bypass peace. And during the twenty twenty four election, rude commercial featured candidates lashing out at the other side, causing America to bypass righteousness. Just like the heart needs surgery when it is damaged or weak, the heartbeat of America requires care when it is out of sync. Filled with hateful rhetoric,
doctor King envisioned an America where justice flows like a mighty river, ensuring equality for all. He dreamed of a nation where innocent immigrants fleeing pain and sorrow can find hope, legally and with dignity. Today, faced with the challenges of division and despair, when innocent children are gunned down at school, Doctor. King would cry out, is there a medic in the room? America needs CPR now because of the pain and gloom.
See, call on God to uphold justice. Just as a surgeon must carefully restart the hearts after surgery, America must actively work to restart its commitment to justice. P, promotes peace among all people. In a world fractured by division, doctor King would implore us to build bridges, not walls. Finally, r, righteous living required. He would say, choose faith and family over fame and fortune. Choose principles over political parties. Vote for character over color.
Love your neighbors more than the likes he gets on TikTok. I stop by to tell you on my way to middle school that doctor King would say, America, you've made it this far. Now try c p r. Thank Congratulations, Montoya. That was awesome. Great job. Great job. We'd also like to congratulate the second place winner, Jay Lauren Brown, a fifth grader from Windsor Village Elementary, and all the HISD students who participated in this year's competition. Their voices reflect the bright future of leadership within our district and beyond.
Now I'd like to ask board member Adam Ravan to read our proclamation recognizing Black History Month. Mister Ravon? Whereas, it's February, Black History Month honors the enduring legacy of struggle and triumph in African Americans and celebrates and and acknowledges the significant contributions African American men and women have made to our city, state, and country. And whereas African Americans have played an important role in such industries as education,
medicine, finance, government, and international trade. And whereas our community benefits from embracing our diverse culture and recognizing outstanding individuals who rise above circumstance and become role models for our children of all races. And whereas Houston ISD school board recognized, proudly and gratefully acknowledges the contribution of African Americans at every level of the district, from parent volunteers and crossing guards to teachers and district staff.
Each one an important part of the team. Now, therefore, we, the members of the Houston Independent School District, school board, and the superintendent of schools proclaim February 2025, Black History Month. NHISD and encourage all to acknowledge and celebrate the rich rich history of African American culture. In witness thereof, on this thirteenth recognition. Superintendent Miles, would you go forward with it? Yes, president, Campo.
At Tanglewood Middle School, students are celebrating black history in a creative and meaningful way through their annual gator grass project, gator grass project, led by our dedicated art teacher, including miss Elizabeth Huerte. This initiative allows students to research and honor influential black figures by designing and building collaborative parade floats. This year, eighth grade eighth graders, Beto Bifakadu, Alejandra Ordonez, and Addison Wassel created a float celebrating the legacy of Louis Armstrong.
Their creative their creativity, teamwork, and dedication reflect the spirit of excellence we strive for across HISD. A special thank you to principal Janelle Kamla for fostering an environment where students can bring learning to life in such a engaging way, and we can't wait to see their hard work on display. Next, president, Campbell and members of the board, we have a special celebration. We celebrate reverend D. Z. Cofield, a dedicated leader who has made a lasting impact on Houston ISD. As a senior pastor of Good Hope Missionary Baptist Church,
he has provided mentorship, scholarships, and support to help our students thrive. Reverend Cofield's commitment to our community and partnership with HISD empowers students to succeed and grow into future leaders. His service is a true reflection of the spirit that strengthens our district. Dizzy Cofield could not be here tonight, but his wife, Tori Cofield, is here tonight, to be recognized on his behalf. And, before we give a round of applause to reverend Cofield, just going off script for a moment, I'd just like to say, I've met the reverend,
Cofield many times over the last year and a half and have come to admire not just his but his family's commitment to equity and education in the Houston area. He has a long time program, radio program, where he reaches thousands of people, and his message is always one of care and equality and justice for all the community. And so, he's been very helpful in the support of HISD,
especially our underserved, communities. I just wanna say a big personal thank thank you to reverend Cofield and his wife, Tori Cofield. So could we recognize reverend Cofield and Tori Cofield at this time? Thank you, superintendent Miles. I I would like, I would like now to take a a personal point of privilege to acknowledge, someone in the in the crowd today. Steve Lechlow, who is our deputy commissioner of governance with the Texas Education Agency is here tonight, and I'd like to invite him, to the microphone.
Steve, good to see you. Good evening, board members. Thrilled to be here in person, with you tonight, to make a special announcement. As you know, in December, doctor Doris Delaney, who was the conservator for this district preceding you guys all the way back to 2016, announced her retirement. Doctor Delaney is amazing, and leaves huge shoes to fill, and I'm here tonight to announce her replacement formally announce her replacement to TEA is confident will provide the exceptional the same exceptional level of leadership that doctor Delaney did
for this district to support you guys in this district's transformation. Doctor Anastasia Lindo Anderson has, for many years, worked in Houston, including as a teacher, principal, and administrator in Houston ISD, working on behalf of at risk students to improve their lives. We feel incredibly fortunate at the agency to be able to, to recruit, someone with of such high caliber to serve in this very important role as the
new conservator for the district. Doctor Anderson will be joining you guys, in closed session just like doctor Delaney did. She this is her first official meeting in your inbox. You'll, be receiving your, the official appointment letter soon. But please do remember as a note that, the presence of a conservator in all of our board of managers districts is part of the agency's playbook. The role of the conservators in Houston, especially in a district as large as Houston, is really to be a partner with the appointed board with the superintendent to,
be a strategic partner, to be a force multiplier, and to be an extra set of eyes, especially important as you guys do the incredibly difficult and important work that you're doing on behalf of kids in such a large district. So, again, doctor Anderson will be, joining you guys, after the open session meeting, but I did wanna formally appear in front of you to introduce her. Doctor Anderson, if you'll just wave real quick. We're thrilled to have her on the team. Thank you, board members. Thank you, mister Anderson. Thank you, deputy commissioner Lecheloe. And welcome, doctor Anderson. Good to see you again.
Absolutely. Okay. So let's, now we're gonna hear from, public public officials, and student speakers, and speakers wishing to, to address, agenda items one, acceptance of board monitoring updates, presentation of goal three, progress measures, goal 3.23, three, and the bulleted items on our agenda, mid year, academic progress in the teacher excellence system for 2020, 2025, '20 '20 '6. Please note that Spanish, live captioning is available for those viewing the meeting via livestream and live Spanish interpretation
is available for persons in the in the in the auditorium. Public comment during school board meetings will only be available to those persons who have signed up to speak prior to the meeting time, per current protocol. Verbal and other disruptions by persons during the board meetings are not acceptable as they inhibit the board's ability to conduct business and the public's ability to to observe those processes. Persons who participate in such behavior will be given one warning, and and if the behavior is repeated, they will be asked to leave the meeting.
We have 63 registered speakers, who will be limited to one minute each per board policy, and we have more than, when we have more than 30 people signed up, to address the board. We ask that you stay on topic and refrain from making, naming individuals, especially students as their identity is protected under law. But you may name your own child. I ask you to please respect our procedures and, the other speakers and and at the end of your comments, promptly, at the end of your comments and also promptly, when your time has expired and the ring and the bell,
timer rings. We'll start with public officials. Will, HSD board member, board education trustee, Savant Moore please come to the microphone? There you go. Sure. Good to see you. Happy Black History Month. Thank you to the community engagement team, board of manager Martinez and Vandy for showing up in Fifth Ward the other week. Stuff like this make a difference. Yet there are many policies still need to be fixed. You say you love us, but we don't see it. You say you like us, but we don't feel it. Your words say one thing, but your actions tell another.
Kids are screaming for help. Where is the policy that says schools are a safe zone from ICE? Instead, you suspend them and send them home where ICE can take them. Students use school choice to access the best education, so you take away their buses, forcing them out of the district. A retired accountant says you're disappointed, and you have her arrested in this very room. To the public, call your governor, your senators, your state reps. Demand they pass senate bill two eighty five five sixty four and house bill two fifty twenty five thirty three to return our district to local control.
Yes. To every believer, pray like never before. They think we have no power, but they are sadly mistaken. No weapon formed against us shall prosper. And let me leave you with this. There was a little girl that you took the bus away from her. Thank you. Next, we will hear from speakers who identified themselves as students, when they checked in this evening. Speakers, please state your name when you step up to the microphone. Miss Smith will be please call our speakers. I'd like to call the student speakers to the front row, please. We have four present this evening. Please move to the front.
Mo Bynum, Isabelle Bunn, Alyanna Gottlieb. Go ahead. Mo Bynum. Good afternoon. My name is Mo Bynum, and I am an eighth grader at Lanier Middle School. During the February 5 sick out in protest of the very policies being discussed at this meeting, fellow students of mine walked out of class in protest. These students were then met with tools in school suspension and parent meetings under the district's new policy meant to notify parents of campus violence. Now I'm not going to stand here and pretend to know everyone's definition of violence, but I am going to ask, if this policy that disappoints students for a peaceful demonstration of resistance to a forceful
overtaking of the school district, is this meant to educate them? And I can tell you without a trace of doubt that anyone with any respect or consideration for future generations should be ready ready to be defend their quality of education and do the bare minimum amount of research into policies claiming to notify parents of campus violence, when in reality, there are hurtful rules designed to oppose resistance. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, Isabelle Dunn. Can I start? Okay. Good evening, members of the HISD board. My name is Isabelle Bunn, and I am a deeply concerned twelfth grade student at Lamar High School.
Tonight, I stand before you not just as a student, but as a voice for the thousands who feel unseen, unheard, and undervalued in a system meant to uplift them. Education is not just about test scores. It is about hope, opportunity, and the promise of a better future. But that promise is being broken. Walk into our schools and you will see it. Libraries stripped away. Teachers overburdened. Students forced into a system that prioritizes compliance over creativity. Control over compassion and test prep over true growth. This is not education. This is not equity,
and this is not justice. The state takeover has only deepened the crisis, replacing stability with chaos. We are told to accept the loss of enrichment, the elimination of libraries, and the erosion of joy in learning, but I'm here to tell you, we will not accept it. Thank you. Good evening. My name is Eliana Gottlieb. As we review mid year academic process, I want to tell you about some absolutely laughable materials I have received in class this year. We have had an exercise analyzing an excerpt from the women of hidden figures about black women who worked at NASA in the fifties and sixties.
Sixties. The exercise was full of AI generated pictures where everyone's face looks the same. In another one, Katherine Johnson has pencils for fingers and is standing in front of a blackboard covered in gibberish. These were real people. We have actual pictures of these heroes working on their computers and at their desks. It would be great to see what they actually looked like, where they worked, and what they were working on. To me, this is disrespectful to what they did accomplished. We also read about feral pigs attacking turtle nests, but the pictures have misspelled words on them, animals that don't exist like a terrifying pig turtle hybrid,
and a turtle sitting in a massive bird's nest made of sticks and leaves. There's plenty more, but I only have a minute. You need to know that the materials you are forcing teachers to use contain information that is wrong and distracting. Please try to do better. Thank you. We also have a student speaker on Zoom. Adina Sage Bittner. Please unmute yourself, and you may begin. My name is Adina Sage Bittner, and I'm a fifth grader at Constead Elementary. School choice ended yesterday, and my friends and I have been talking about where we hope to go for sixth grade. Our parents have been talking about which schools are secretly NES.
On school tours, we asked how many teachers are certified, what books students are reading, and what electives and activities are offered. We asked about field trips, PTO events, and opting out of math and star tests. NES schools are lacking in these areas. NES is supposed to be good for the lowest performing schools, but families aren't buying it. No one wants it. Everyone wants to get far away from it. Families with options are leaving because NES isn't real learning. It's test prep for with scripted lessons from uncertified teachers.
I can't change that, but the board of managers can. You made the lowest performing school as NES, and only you can fix it. Vote on vote no on item five and say say what the community has been NES is not educating students. Thank you. Are there any other students in person? Any other students, out here? Okay. Well, when they get here, we'll, we'll put them on the agenda. Okay. Let's, then move to, we're gonna call, in person speakers who to the microphone for agenda item one, monitoring mid mid year academic progress in the teacher excellence system.
So group of speakers one through seven, please come up. And please state your name when you, begin. Group a, first speaker, Laura Hennette Oliveira. Go ahead. And next will be Catherine Donas, then Victoria Ferdette. Please state your name and begin. Go ahead. Hi. My name is Laura Oliveira. First, I wanted to say, wow. Miss Montoya was amazing. Thank God she saw as a librarian. Right? So my big word of the day is failed. But first I came here to congratulate you, mister Miles. You received a failing grade in communications with the communities and culture within the environment.
An overall d, really. Can you imagine if that were a teacher or a school administrator? They would have been fired immediately. But here you are, and you still get a 6 figure bonus. It's ridiculous. All of you have failed. You have even given yourselves a low score for advocacy time to time to get the schools back to the community, and let us choose the appropriate leadership. Like I told you once before, I Thank you. Those 10 sports. Thank you. Catherine Donis. To the moms of Liberty, we noticed you did not stand up when the beautiful child performed before us.
That beautiful child's voice is valuable and will not be silenced by discrimination or bias. You will not dim her light, and she will continue to shine brightly. Mike Miles, controversy, violated school district policies, procedures, questionable hires, budget shenanigans, attempts to stymie internal investigation. Miles, did you manipulate the school board and its policies to dramatically increase your pay and unlawfully create a supplemental retirement programs to benefit yourself? I wonder if you did, because you would be that type of person. Thank you. Victoria Firdette. I was gonna speak today to Mike Miles' failing performance performance assessment that resulted in
a 6 figure bonus that in fact is public record record because he's not a certified superintendent, but I think that will be well covered by other speakers tonight. I was gonna speak to the KPRC investigation that uncovered $2,000,000 in HST spending on bond electioneering, but I'm confident that because the evidence is overwhelming, this will be investigated by the DEA, and this corruption will be exposed. Instead, I will speak to the fact that I'm tired. I'm tired of spending one Thursday a month here speaking to an unelected board and a superintendent who refuses to listen to our community. I'm tired of spending time away from my kindergarten age daughter,
but it's because of her that I will and and all the other children at HAIC that I will continue showing up at board meetings, public protests, and everything else possible until HAIC has an elected board again. Thank you. Thank you. Eileen Harrell. While encouraging the aggregated midyear student outcome data does not fully align with the vision of the board, which is closing the gaps in student outcome data. Our students do not succeed or fail on a district level aggregated data. We need to understand and evaluate the disaggregated student level data by subpopulation,
by campus, looking at NES and PUA. We need to understand the impact particularly on our special education and emergent bilingual students. The report this evening gives us none of those data. Disaggregated data better align align with the goal progress measures monitored by the board and achieving the best outcomes for our students. I look forward to when we see that data, and I hope it's soon. Thank you. Hello. My name is Ramona Acuna. I'm a proud Southeast, Brown Barrette and community member. I am here today to stand as solidarity with the Northside forty five.
The brave students who have were suspended for standing up for their committee community and their future. Last Friday, these students exercise their right to protest against the injustice affecting their families, their friends, their fear, their rage, the policies that threaten their safety and dignity. On top of all that harm changes harmful changes happening in their school, instead of listening, h I h I s d chose to punish them, sending them a clear message, sit down, shut up, and don't fight back. But we see you, Northside forty five. Your voices matter. Your your courage matters,
and no suspension will erase the truth you are speaking. Schools should be a place where students learn to lead, not a place where they are punished for it. HISD should be protecting its students, not silencing them. There must be a clear policy that keeps Thank you. Thank you. Marie Hoff Hoffman Lock, you're next. My father died two weeks ago. He graduated UT Law School in the top 10% of his class, and he retired as senior counsel of Exxon Mobil Gas Marketing Company. He taught me a great deal about leadership and integrity. One of his best lessons was how to identify young attorneys with great leadership potential.
He called it the oh shoot test. A young attorney faced the oh shoot test when she had submitted a brief to my father, and he returned it, asking a few questions that hinted at the fault in her argument. The attorney passed if her response was, oh shoot, A recognition that she had blown it, and she needed to go back and start over. If she instead tried to justify her flawed position, she failed. It made my day my dad's day when they passed. Mister Miles has faced the oh shoot test several times. When there was 42% teacher turnover rate,
when the enrollment at NES schools decreased, when the bond failed, he's failed every time, and you gave him a bonus. Will you pass the oh shoot test? Thank you. Ria Maria Benzon, you may begin. Hi. My name is doctor Maria Benzon. Once again, I'm here to call out misleading data. If you wanna be data driven, start with accurate and complete numbers. Right now, that's not happening. Take exhibit eight. It claims at the beginning of the year, eleventh graders who earned AP credit was eighteen percent, dual enrollment, four point nine percent, and dual credit, sixteen percent. But in September,
the same data showed AP at twenty six percent, dual enrollment at nine percent, and dual credit at fourteen percent. Why are past numbers smaller in later reports? Are you lowering baseline data to fabricate progress? This pattern is clear. Fixed fabricate progress? This pattern is clear. Fix the data. Tell the truth. Stop manipulating numbers. If you made an error, admit it. If the methodology changed, explain it. But stop gaslighting the public. The public deserves the truth, not a carefully crafted narrative designed to colonoscopy, when you take a close look, the problems are obvious. We see them. Do you?
Thank you. Thank you. Darcy LaRota, you may begin. Okay. Can you hear me? Yes. Go ahead. Alright. Okay. So tonight, I'm actually speaking on behalf of an employee at Wharton's Language Academy. They state, fire principal Celadon. She engages in manipulative and narcissistic behavior rather than foster collaboration and trust among staff. Many of us have experienced disrespect, belittlement, and a lack of acknowledgment for hard work. It's disheartening to witness a leader who consistently shifts blame onto her staff while refusing to accept accountability for her poor decisions. Our students sense the tension negativity that permeate the school environment.
It's crucial we'll provide our children with a safe encouraging place to avoid of such distress. Teachers, staff, most importantly, children are suffering from her oppressive regime. Sell it on is self serving, demeaning behavior, and your inability to foster a supportive environment has converted our workplace to a nightmare. Now I'll use I'll use my own words and my own personal statement as Darcy LaRota. I want to rec the record to show that Veronica Seledon is a moron, but is emblematic of Mike Miles' mission to groom our children Thank you. Because all of his rabid leaders.
Thank you. Carol and Shipp, please turn your camera on, and you may begin. Looks like she's connecting to audio. Miss Ship, we don't have audio for you. Miss Ship, you're not connected to audio. Okay. Now now am I Yes. Go ahead. My name is Carol Ann Shipp. I'm a retired HISD teacher of 38 with three grandchildren in the district. Back today to talk about goal 3.3. The percent of eleventh graders who qualify for college credit will increase will increase from 3% in May 2023 to 48% in May 2028.
I failed to see how the current curriculum can prepare anyone for college, much less college credit. I taught pre IB tenth grade English and was IB coordinator for my campus. The tenth grade English lesson that I saw tried to cram a poetry conventions in one lesson about an uninspiring point, tedious crimes. Students need to read novels, discuss with their peers in a teacher directed setting, and write compositions that are Thank you. What's that? Okay. Alright. That concludes our, hearing of speakers on agenda item one,
monitoring the report midyear academic progress and teacher excellent system. So now we're going to, go to presentation. So superintendent Miles will now present board monitoring update and goal three progress measures three point two and three point three. Superintendent Miles? Yes, sir. Yes. Absolutely. We'll hold for that. Please come forward. Did they okay. Give him a minute. Yes. Please state your name. Thank you. Hello. My name is Joshua Ramos. I am from Northside High School. I'm here because of the February 7. I was protesting for my loved ones,
family members, family members, and friends. It is unjust to expel a student from school all because they were using the freedom of speech. Where I'm going with this is I wanna talk about the first amendment. In December fifteenth of seventeen ninety one, James Madison wrote the first amendment stating that any person may use their freedom of speech to express their religious beliefs, express their emotions, talk about their political key. What I'm trying to say with this is that this amendment does not just work on adults, but it's also made for teens and kids. It applies to anybody. But when they're using freedom of speech,
you guys were fighting to expel us as a students. I wonder why. We, the students that were protesting, were doing it in this peace poop sorry. Peaceful manner with a good intention. We apologize for the students that were misbehaving and being You can keep going. Go ahead. Please turn his mic on. Excuse me? Go ahead. Nothing to do with reckless part. You guys should have checked the cameras to see who was the one being misbehaving. In any part in any loudly making it clear that we are here to protest protest in a peaceful manner. I don't want any of you breaking anything or being reckless. I would like for all of you to give power to the students and for
the suspensions to get off out of our record and to keep ice out of our learning centers. And instead of investing money in ice rates, the money shouldn't be invested into every school to make it into a better learning environment. Last year, we had an unfortunate loss in Marshall Middle School, all because you weren't paying for more ACs. All I am saying is that you guys should focus more on what matters. As board members, you guys need to do better, be better. Thank you. Are are there any other students that, that have arrived? Okay. So, superintendent Miles, you have the floor.
Yes. I've asked, chief Kristen Hole and her team to, come forward to present the progress monitoring. Alright. Okay. Good evening, board members. Today, we're doing the goal progress monitoring for three point two and three point three. This is part of goal three, which is the percent of students graduating TSI ready and with an industry based certification, and the goal is that it increases from eleven percent from the 21, 20 two graduates to twenty six percent to the 26, 20 seven graduates. So last year, we met this goal, and today, we're gonna be speaking about three point two and three point three progress measures,
in service of goal three. So goal progress measure 3.2 is the percent of tenth, eleventh, and twelfth grade students who are on track to achieve CTE completer status, by, by graduation, and that we increased that completer status from thirty four percent in 2023 to forty nine percent in May, 2028. So just to level set what is a completer, a completer is a student who is focused in one particular career track or one particular program of study, and that student has to both get at least four, credits in that program,
and the courses in which they're getting credits have to be at least a level three or four course. So they're really required to build a deep expertise in that very particular career program to be considered a completer, and so this is really looking at the students on track to receive, that status. And again, this is important for two reasons as it relates to the broader goal. The first reason, it's it's important because if students are completers, that means they're taking multiple courses and building their expertise in that career, and that enables them to be more likely to obtain that industry based certification,
which is what the goal is tied to. And additionally, the TEA accountability system is moving towards, the, that direction where you have to be both a completer and obtain your IBC. So this particular goal progress measure, is important to help us make sure both of those things happen. When we actually look at the graph on the right, when we're looking at middle of the year results, at the middle of the year, forty six percent of our students are are on track to be completers, and that exceeds the end of year goal of thirty six percent. So we do believe we'll be able to hit that thirty percent, thirty six percent end of year target,
for CTE completers. We also look at it by student group, and on the left, you see every single student group's current, middle of year goal is already exceeding the end of year target. So for all student groups, we're also, currently on track, to reach our end of year goal. And then on the graph on the right, we've broken it up both by student group, but also by grade level. And so what the graph on the right really does tell us is that, in tenth grades, many, many students, a much higher percent of students are on track to be completers,
because at the end of that fall semester, they only need half a credit. But they have to continue in that course sequence to stay on track to be completers, which is why we see that historic drop. And this is true for a couple of reasons. One, maybe a student decides not to continue in CTE courses, or maybe they switch programs. So if you started in entrepreneurship and you switched to nursing, you actually won't be a completer in entrepreneurship. You have to kinda start over. So it's really important that we're paying attention to students kind of maintaining in that program as they progress from grade to grade.
And this graph on the right tells us we need to be paying a lot more attention to that. Whenever we're also, as part of this board report, looking at 3.3. This might feel familiar because we reported on 3.3 beginning of the year results, at the last board meeting, but this report shows the middle of the year results as well. Again, what you see on the left is the percent of eleventh grade students who are qualified for college credit. At the beginning of the year results, we were at twenty six percent, and that's because it's really only counting the ninth and tenth graders who'd received college
credit. At the middle of the year, it also counts those eleventh graders who got credit just in that first semester since we're in February right now. So that's why you see the jump from 26 to 32%, and we do believe we're on track to hit the end of the year target, which is 35%. We also look at this, across student groups as well, and, one of the things we did here is we said, okay, for students who are gonna be who if we're trying to get increase the percent of students obtaining college credit, we also need to pay a lot of attention to enrollment, because they have to be enrolled in the course to then be able to obtain
a credit in the course. So we pulled enrollment by student group, and what you really see for all students at the top is compared to twenty three twenty four, we increased enrollment in college coursework, by 9%, which is a really huge jump. You see this is true for Asian students, for, Hispanic and Latino students, and for students with disabilities. So across all of those student groups, we saw a really big increase in enrollment, and that's one of the reasons we also feel confident we're gonna be on track to hit that end of the year target. This this view looks at the same thing from each of the different types of
college credit you can get. On the far left, you see AP. The reason the AP number hasn't changed from beginning of year to middle of the year is because you don't have an AP core you don't take the AB test in the middle of the year. You only take it at the end. So that one will remain flat. The IB percentage will also remain flat because, again, you wouldn't take the IB test until you're an eleventh grader at the end of the year. But where we see the jump is in dual enrollment and in dual credit, because in both of those options, you have that semester course that you can take. And so for example, our HCC students that were enrolled in a first semester HCC course will have tamed
their credit, and that's why you see that middle of the year jump. But across all areas, we would expect to see another jump at the end of the year, to show that all of those students who are in the in eleventh grade will obtain credit. So, in summary, we do believe we'll be on track for both targets come targets come the end of the year, and I'll talk a little bit more around the root cause analysis and the key actions for each. So for CTE, and this really, this you could really see this in the tenth, eleventh, and twelfth grade numbers that we pull. But one of the most important things to that we are paying attention to this
year is the scheduling of students so that they can continue in their existing programs. In prior years, there wasn't a way to essentially track or monitor that, and we've now been able to integrate that into our centralized scheduling tools so that we can see and make sure that students are on track to maintain in their existing programs. And the flip side to that is making sure we're training the counseling and advising staff. So in addition to the scheduling tools to support it, making sure our counselors, are trained to have those conversations with students so they understand the implications of their choices, and they have support to make sure they can continue in that program sequence.
We also have our foundational programs of study. As a reminder, those are those are the four, high wage, high demand programs that we implemented across all comprehensive high schools. Whenever we implemented these programs, we both implemented high quality curriculum and the ability to monitor a lot of the data for students in those courses, and so we're continuing to focus on that. But, additionally, it helps our highly mobile students have those options when they move from high school to high school, and that's gonna enable them to continue in a particular program if they are moving.
And, we're we're also, we monitor and evaluate CTE progress holistically, so our team meets with the CTE campus leadership monthly, at every campus to look at the fidelity of the program, make sure we're on track for supporting students to become completers, and to really ensure that all CTE programs, are are being implemented successfully. And then the final piece to that is the real world experiences with our business partners. So when we're partnering with businesses, we're really looking at two main things. One is, can they help us continue to build strong programs? Can they give us feedback on our curriculum,
make sure our programs are aligned with the future of the industry? But that can they also help us by giving students experiences with those employers, whether that be internships, externships, exposure to, those careers as a part of the actual programming in that career. So we're continuing to add and expand the number of business partners that we're working with. For the 3.3, this is the college credit. We continue to highlight some of the things we've highlighted in previous board meetings. First is the opt out policy, so students are automatically enrolled into, college courses when they're demonstrating academic readiness.
We also have an advanced, course, strategic scheduling platform where we have tools again that monitor, making sure students are successfully enrolled and that campuses have the right Number of offerings to support those students who are ready. We continue to make, the freely available high quality curriculum for, these courses as well as continue to focus on high quality instruction. And so no major changes in this area from last month, except scheduling is coming up actually right now. Students will start scheduling in February, so February and March will be really critical for both of these metrics and making
sure we stay on track for them as we continue. And that's it. Okay. Great. Before I open the, floor for, lot of questions that are technical and tactical in nature, before tonight's meeting. They are posted online for the public to be able to see those answers. Tonight, let's keep our questions in in the more strategic nature so we can really understand the realities of of how, this, how this is aligning with our students' achievements. So with that, who has the first question? Mister Vaughn? Thank you, miss Hola. This, presentation is always good and I appreciate that you're on this. We've asked a lot of questions to the board president's,
for the board president's, earlier comments and I appreciate you reaching out and sharing, the details of those answers. One of the things and and one of the three lines that that I've I've spoken about previously is ensuring and helping us in the community kinda see clarity through the numbers. You know, we we talk about some things being confusing like c CGI and these sorts of things. To me, I think this is probably one of the more confusing areas because there's so many parts and pieces, that make up, an IBC and and getting a student to complete a status.
And so one of the things I would, like to understand from your point of view is how we can better, indicate through leading and lagging indicators that we're presenting, whether it's supplemental or additional, kind of a a a easy, way to grasp that when we say we're on track, it's easier to flow through the presentation. I still have a hard time with that, knowing that, I'm I'm looking at multiple parts here. I I I continually go back and forth, with that. So that's just a comment,
to consider. But as as I go a little bit deeper, one of the things that we see each, period, like, example on exhibit number, exhibit number sorry there. Exhibit number two, is on the right. What we see is that there's a trend for negative attrition between middle of the year and end of the year. And that trend suggests that the CTA program, success is, and the status as school ends, it it changes. We we lose, folks who we've considered, completer status or percentage of those that are in that space.
So in the last two years, what I you know, just rough math is about 22%, between middle of the year and end of the year, we find that we we have some attrition. And that's concerning for me because at 46%, if we lose 22% of those, it then falls in that category of concern. Right? Like, we're plus or minus one. Maybe we'll hit it, maybe we won't. So I I understand the things that you mentioned earlier. What gives you confidence though that, that we've got got the pieces in place to ensure that we actually achieve the
target, which ultimately helps us achieve the long term goal? Thank you for asking that. I think the primary thing is historically, we haven't been able to centrally monitor scheduling. It's it's been individually done at the campus, so now when scheduling comes up, we really should be able to see, hey, out of you know, if we had a hundred students, 90 of them stayed in their program and 10% didn't, and we should know that, even before next school year starts. And so that just allows us to be much more proactive in following up, and anytime we see that being an issue,
with the campus leadership team to either make sure there's a correction or make sure that if students are leaving a program, they've had the right conversation with the counselor, they understand the implications. A student really may say, hey, I started in nursing and I can't stand the sight of blood, and I I need to do something else. And we wanna acknowledge that student's preference, but we just wanna make sure that, they're not hopping from program to program without understanding the con the, the benefit of going deep in one. So truly centralized monitoring is probably the thing that gives me the most confidence that,
we'll be able to meet it because we haven't historically had that ability to to do that in the district. Got it. And then just to follow-up to that is related to the lagging nature of our data. So our ultimate goal is in 2028, that we are able to achieve with a certain, goal. And so to get to 49%, roughly half of our students being in this category, we'd be looking at that year at tenth graders who are current tenth graders this year. In order to achieve that status, completer category, of those who are currently in the completer category.
So to do that, I'm thinking about the cohort and I'm saying to myself, none of the other cohorts have remained that if I look at exhibit, four on the next page, we see that between tenth grade and and twelfth grade, we dropped precipitously. So so, again, I I know that we've got a lot of pieces in place. I just, want to sort of harp on the fact that this is a big change from what has occurred in the past, and I would love to see us, easily be able to, you know, see through that through line of how we do it.
I'm not sure that I currently have enough to say that we're we're there. So I just encourage you to continue to help me and help others understand, like, what do we how do we make sure this cohort is successful, because this is the ultimate goal is to give them pathways to succeed in life. Mhmm. So it's it's it's of critical importance that we get there. And I don't think it changes the importance of scheduling, but I will say we have had the explicit conversations when we're planning for this,
that this is a mindset shift where the focus on retention is critical to to being able to accomplish this given how much we've seen in students dropping out of their program. So I think we do acknowledge it is a big mindset shift at that campus level, but we've addressed that and we've been talking about that, with our, campus leaders, and with our division staff so that we're prepared to again monitor and take action whenever, so we don't see that type of a drop off going forward. Who's next? Go ahead. Good afternoon and thank you for the presentation. I wanted to,
one of the questions on the Q and A, question number seven, referenced, PUA versus NES. And it talks about how we made some changes specifically in NES to make sure that there's more AP courses available than last year. And it refers to the strategy, but it doesn't necessarily go into that strategy. So what exactly are we doing in NES schools to ensure that they have equal or more, opportunities than they did last year? Mhmm. We made one very specific change in tenth grade, which was important because it will impact the BOI results for 3.3, which is that we integrated an AP course for students who an AP seminar for
students who are, enrolled in advanced English too. And so in NAS across the board, you'll see more students accessing AP earlier in tenth grade, so that was one change. But in addition to that, the overall, opt out policy still applies to NES. So in every single core, subject, math, reading, science, and social studies, when students are at that academic attainment level, they auto enroll into college course works, and you typically will see that a lot in eleventh and twelfth grade. And sometimes we'll have choices, you know, it might be the which advanced math math do you want,
which advanced science do you want, but that auto enroll process still applies in NES. K. That's good. And I'll and I'll go back to a a question comment I made, I think, when we last reviewed this, which is, to board member Adam's point is we have a big drop, right, from sophomore to seniors. And I know that part of that is because some some of our students need to go and complete courses in order to meet graduation requirements. But I just wanna continue to kind of reiterate that in those instances, because kids are having to go back to students, they're having to go back to meet graduation requirements, the likelihood that they are gonna graduate and have an opportunity to succeed in in
a career is limited because now they're no longer one is they're barely graduating. And two, now they're no longer in in in a CTE course or I leading to an IBC. So what can we as a district do to in to increase opportunities for them to, yes, we're gonna make sure they graduate, but they're still that IBC doesn't go to waste, in other words. And so that's just a food for thought. Yes. One thing we're actually doing, as we continue to enhance our CTE programs is we're looking at all four CTE courses within one program, and we're actually integrating multiple IBCs in many of them.
So we are actually aligning IVCs to each course. So you might have a program where you say, hey, I'm gonna take a course in ninth grade, a course in tenth grade, I'm gonna take one IVC, I'm gonna continue to take a course in eleventh and twelfth grade, and I actually take might take then a more rigorous IVC. And so we're actually historically, the district has really only given IBCs when they're in eleventh or twelfth grade, but we actually do think many programs, students will be ready to take, some of them much earlier because different IBCs have different levels of difficulty. So that's one way we're addressing is in many programs, students will be able to,
one, take multiple, and have multiple credentials when they graduate, but two, take them take it earlier when it makes sense and when it aligns to that particular course. So that's one thing. I think the other big strategy here is actually what we're doing holistically across academics, because one reason students are getting stuck with not meeting graduation requirements is if they failed a course and they have to retake that course, And that takes up time in their schedule when it's already taken up time in their schedule in previous years. So as we continue to support students in passing their courses and meeting grade level
standards, and if they don't automatically support them in a remedial course, so that they can then pass right away, that will also prevent students not having that time at the end of the year, where they have to retake courses that they've already taken time for. That sounds good. And then just to reiterate how important this is, I think there's, an article by the Chronicle that shared that's, less than twenty percent of our 02/2017 graduates were able to make a living wage Yeah. Six years after graduation. Less than 20%. Mhmm. And so that that's important, that we continue to give them opportunities through graduation and IBCs in particular.
Thank you. And even to comment on that, for every single program of study, we have information about the specific careers that it leads to, and we're identifying careers that are above living wage now. And we're building the program of study to allow students to access that career, so right out of high school, they could be making a living wage. So for every program, we're identifying again those exact career opportunities so that we break that right when they graduate. Because we've seen that data too, and it's definitely, the exact thing we're trying to avoid. Good question.
I have a quick question. So on, I just wanna make sure I'm looking at this right. And is there a, I'm looking at exhibit three. Is can you just explain kind of the what strategies we're using to to adjust, I guess, from middle of year to end of year. I think to mister Ravan's question earlier, I mean, we saw results back in 2324 that were higher than this year at middle of the year. And so I assume we're adjusting our strategy. You just gave one example, which was the tenth grade, tenth graders at NES campuses.
Is there anything else like that that's I don't know if it's low hanging fruit, but something that we can implement that will help us achieve the goal at the end of the year. Mhmm. I think this is completer status, which, well, so one of the things that we are doing in in career, in CTE courses, and we started this with our foundational programs of study, because we've standardized all the curriculum, but we are implementing, quarterly assessments to help our principals monitor the success of those students. And so for the first time, we've been able to report back, how they're doing significantly ahead of the IBC.
So we're implementing that. We focused on that in the, foundational programs of study, but the goal is to expand that so we have a lot more information, before we take that IVC that students will be successful, and that allows us to do much quicker remediation to make sure those students, are successful. The other thing we've we're doing that we haven't done, the district hasn't done previously, is we're also ensuring that all students who are supposed to be signing up for an IBC actually do and monitoring the rostering process for IBCs, again, to make sure that they take it because that'll allow us to monitor pass rate,
and it will actually allow even if they take it and and don't pass it allows to, again, continue support that student. So making sure they're getting there, and prepared for it. Thank you. Questions over here. Go ahead. Thank you for that additional information. I'm thinking, as well about shifts from midyear to end of year, and, you've talked about how integrating the platforms and tech gives you a way to analyze the data. Can you tell us, I really appreciate the last example that you you gave, but can you tell us a little bit more about the strategy of,
kind of are there triggers that go on electronically, or who is the person making sure that it is being monitored and then adjusted for? Or is this something that you use in the reflection period to adjust for the next year? Like, which part of it Mhmm. If things get out of line on a campus and say all of a sudden there's some percentage drop, is there a trigger or does a human person have to see that? Is that one more thing on the principal's list? Like, how are you adjusting to make sure that someone's Mhmm.
Coming in at the right moment? It's a great question. I I think there's two parts. The first part is the student, scheduling piece. So when the student goes and does their course selection, and what we've done for that piece is automate it to where they see on the college credit side, if they're ready to take college credit, they see only that college credit option. On the CTE course side, if they're already in a found in a program, they only see that next course for that program. And so there's a lot more that has to happen for them to get scheduled, for them to select the wrong schedule.
Mhmm. And then after the student piece closes, our team builds the tools that roll up the results of that, after this, master schedule happens. So we then analyze the actual schedule, and and we'll just give the principal the report that says, hey. 97% of your students who are supposed to be in advanced courses actually are, and that allows them to immediately dive in and focus on those that weren't and make sure that it's for the right reason. And so we build all those supports for them, and then we take it to them so that we can work with them. Does that mean then it's one more thing on the principal's responsibility?
It's not there's not some person with oversight helping that? A lot of our counselors are the ones that support the master schedule process, so we really the principal is responsible for everything at their campus, but we're primarily working with counselors throughout all of scheduling. And we do do a lot of training for them on that schedule. And what we really do with the principal is is we're really clear around the goals. Right? Here's right? For, industry based certifications and CTE programs, our goal is to make sure students are continuing in that program.
Mhmm. But the implementation of that typically is happening, between our teams and our counselors to make sure it's done correctly, and and, we're keeping principals up to date. I'm still hearing some some area for fuzz. If like, say something's really going wrong in some counseling department. I'm wondering if y'all have the manpower to, to not just provide, but provide and also just make sure that doesn't slip. I'm how do you ensure that it doesn't slip through the cracks if
there's something going on in a particular department. I understand you give them the data, but We we well, two things. One, we do give them the data, but we work with them. We we don't just give it to them and leave, we work with them. But the other piece of this is that, on the division side, there's also our executive directors of support. So even if something is going wrong, it doesn't even always have to be the principal that fixes it. We're working really closely with divisions all the time to make sure we're able to implement the things that we're trying to do. So our team works a lot with counselors on training,
but our divi we also work we meet with the division support team weekly to make sure that they're also helping on the division side. So you feel confident that the plan does not leave holes where where where our new tech and our platform and the people, we feel confident that that we would find gaps at the campus. I mean, we're we're we tested the advanced course, advanced scheduling tool last year, and that is what led to the 9% increase in enrollment. And so we do think that was successful. And so, of course, there's always gonna be ways we can improve tools that we build and make things
easier to use, but the data doesn't lie. And so while there's a gap, we until it's addressed, we continue to work with the right people to fix it. I believe you. I just I was asking. Thank you. That was a good answer. Thanks. Anybody else? Go ahead. Hi, chief. Hold. For clarity's sake, can you because I have often used them interchangeably. Can you define the difference between between dual credit and dual enrollment? Just so I'm perfectly clear. Yes. So dual credit, is our partnership with HCC,
and so our HCC courses, we call dual credit courses. Dual enrollment is our partnership with the University of Texas, and so our dual enrollment courses are, the UT OnRamps courses where students are getting credit at UT. Okay. So if we were just saying dual dual credit or dual enrollment across the country, not HCC or UT, which ones because I understand that some students may get college and, high school credit. Some may be get college credit that may not necessarily apply for high school credit. Can you explain that for me,
please? Yes. And it actually is something we typically have to work through a lot. Whenever we are offering a dual credit or a dual enrollment course, we both have to have the TEA course that matches the, HCC or UT course. So if HCC has a course, but we actually don't have that course from TEA, we can't offer it. We can't give students credit for that. So a lot of the work that we do that's actually fairly labor intensive is we sit down with HCC, and we say, here's all let's take one of our foundational programs of study.
TEA gives us a very select set of courses that we can offer in that program. And so we sit down and we say, what courses do you have that match the courses that we have? And we have to crosswalk those courses to make sure that a student would be able to obtain credit both, at in Houston, but also at the college. Mhmm. And if we can't find that crosswalk, we don't offer that, for students because then they can't get any credit for it in high school. So that's the challenge is again, you have to find the course that counts for both the college side and,
the HISD side per the select set of courses that TEA provides us. Okay. Okay. So thank you for that. So is is I'm I'm hearing that there's not a situation where student would be receiving college credit for a course and it not be applicable for their high school requirements? Or They shouldn't. They shouldn't. They shouldn't. That's it. Sometimes, you know, it's been tried off and we have to go say, no. You can't do that because, again, it has to be able to match one of our courses. What we do try to do is say, okay, if a student is in a is in a, program of study,
and they're in our courses in ninth and tenth and eleventh grade, what are the courses they could take in the summer if they did wanna obtain more credit? That doesn't have to be necessarily, an HISD course, but we can give them options for additional courses in the summer if they wanted to do that. So again, we try to really stay focused on, in when they're enrolled with us, they need to be getting credit, at HISD, and so we find that crosswalk. Great. Okay. Thank thank you for that. I appreciate your explanation. So I had a question in the q and a just to I I wanted kind of a a chart of all of our schools and schools and which programs
they were offered. And it appears that, and again, I I I'm not completely clear on the definition of an IB program and and what it entails and what's different than other programs. But it just seems that we are we don't have as many IB programs for our high school students. Just wondering about because it was it was a big deal when I was in school. I don't know. I hear different things now. So just wondering about how we're viewing IB programming, the viability and sustainability of it as it relates to to other programs and and
having our students hit these marks. Mhmm. So I'll say two things. One thing with IB programming is I do think it'll continue to go back to constraint three, which is if a principal is making a program change, that's something we need to talk about before anything actually happens, if they're choosing if they wanna shift between IB and something else. So we're trying to make sure we're very intentional before anyone moves away from IB programming. But more broadly, when we're actually thinking about if we were looking here, hey, we have four different ways you can obtain college credit. What we actually do is say,
okay, if I'm actually looking just at, you know, an advanced science course, we say, okay, if there's an advanced science course at, you know, HCC and at UT, which one should the principal pick? And so what we really do is just try to support them in where are your students being most successful, and where can it be most successful at that campus. In a lot of these instances, the courses don't overlap. So for example, HCC offers numerous, career tech ed courses for dual credit that UT OnRamps doesn't offer. Right? So it's not a choice, but when it is a choice, we really do support students,
camp principles and saying, what does your data tell you where your students are being most successful? Okay. So, again, this chart is pretty telling. So what does that tell us about the future of IB, I guess? What what is what should we discern about where IB is going? For us, all IB programs are continuing unless a campus submits a request to change that, at which case at that time, it'll be evaluated. I understand that. I'm I'm just curious about so do we have any information about IB in general across the country and how how those programs are doing?
Are they being replaced by other programs? I'm just trying to get an understanding of what's happening with IB. We we can look at that for you if you'd like. We could we could talk. Thank you. And I'll and I'll do some research and we can kinda share as well. I'm just I'm just very curious about the the, offerings. I do understand whenever we sunset a program, it'll be brought in front of us, but I was just curious as to, any points around that. One last question. Question. I really appreciate our students getting, that real life experience in with Harris Health and, CVS and Chevron Shipping. Those are all really great.
I'm curious about, and I looked it up on our website. I didn't find anything. So I'm asking you, do we still have an HISD, a co op program that allows students to, you know, I'm generally explaining this, spend half a day at school and then half a day literally going to work in industry, with a business partner, you know, just to get that, again, real life experience, but also get paid, which is a huge incentive to kinda stay on track. Mhmm. So just curious about do we have any thoughts? I know we have, a a person or a group that's working on business partnerships.
But but what's our view on on co ops? Because that was definitely a thing when I was in high school in HSD. I do believe we have them with a couple. Like, I think Merit Construction is one example, where we have a a very specific program that allows for that. So I think it just needs to be very explicitly designed into that program of study, and we do, wanna make sure that if students are going off-site, that, they're, on track to complete all of their, you know, additional credits. So I think the answer is yes. We're open to that as part of how we plan for every program,
and I can follow-up with you to let you know if there's, like, the specific ones we currently have. Okay. Thank you, chief. Go ahead. Can I ask a quick question just so it might avoid the data dive on IB? Can you tell us a little bit about what it takes to be I don't mean the specific things, but about IB certification versus AP, and and the staff that we have relative to to so that we can better understand why do we have so many AP, and there's just not a bunch of IB.
Can you kind of tell us about that? Yeah. I mean, I think the main thing is for AP, there's many, many, many, many AP course options, and you can just take one AP course. And if you have the right teacher who's certified to teach that AP course, you know, you you you could take that AP course and Mhmm. Right? So and that's very different than IP as a program. They're implementing an entire framework, to to implement that program, typically across a full school. So it's just a different Mhmm. Program, typically across a full school. So it's just a different Mhmm. Thing where AP isn't a program, it's a course. Do you have more AP certified teachers than the district,
or more IB certified? I can get back to you on that. I don't wanna say the wrong answer. But I'm pretty sure it's AP. I just just so that people can kind of understand the logistics, that that that there has there there hasn't been some proactive, reason to expand or not expand based on philosophy rather than staffing? I mean, for for AP, that is where we're really pushing in in a lot of the auto enrollment process because we can say, hey, this actually is that next, math or science course that you need to take,
and that's an AP course option, and then we work to certify, you know, as we're increasing volume and as we're increasing enrollment, we're constantly certifying more teachers to be able to teach in that way. So AP is the specific strategy in many cases for the auto enrollment. Yeah. The opt out policy, where, again, we're trying to make sure students have access to the right courses. Thank you. I I I just wanna make a point here, because we were talking, and doctor Cruz Arnold of the college board kinda let us know about, Texas requirements for AP teachers and how like,
just to be clear, you do not have to be certified to be an AP teacher. I just wanna make sure that everybody's clear on that. And we do understand a lot of time industry experience is way up here, subject matter experts and things like that, but you do not have to be certified to teach AP courses, what we heard earlier. Yeah. We just make sure they get the proper training. Gotcha. Thank you. Go ahead. Thank you so much. One thing I haven't heard yet that, I've got a a burning question about is if for goal progress measure 3.2, if we're gonna increase that percentage over over the coming years,
and to, mister Revant's point earlier around this big drop from from tenth to twelfth grade that we see in the data now, what needs to be true before you hit ninth grade in order to, achieve these goals and sort of flipping the script a bit? Like, I'm thinking, you know, for the children I know hitting ninth grade to have to to pick one career track at that point seems like a very challenging thing to do. So there feel like there there needs it feels like there's a lot of things that need to be true in order to to to see the success that the
state may be anticipating with this with this guidance of since ninth grade completer status. But also what needs to be true in the district for students to be ready. Mhmm. That needs to be happening by middle school in order to make, I guess, a a better inform a more informed choice by then. So I'm I'm actually a bit, I'm I'm having trouble with gold with GPM 3.2 right now for for some of those reasons. Can you Mhmm. Enlighten us on a bit on that? Yes. And it's it's, such a valid point because, again, we do want students to be selecting a career path that they're excited about and
that they're passionate about. So one thing we did this year, is in eighth grade, in their coursework, in their in especially in NES integrated into their art of thinking coursework. We went over all of our, foundational programs of study tracks where they just got exposure to what they are and what type of careers that you can get, and different things about them. And we did some others as well. And then we also just went over, things like advanced coursework and things that are available and those options. And we're actually expanding that exposure course to sixth and seventh as well, so we have a little bit more time, to build there. So I think the more we can expose students to the different paths earlier,
the more we're gonna be able to support them, in in the right selection, for that. And I think the flip to that is also making sure, our counselors and advisors have exposure to that. Not just from, like, hey, here's the name of the course, but what does that course mean? How do we bring that to life for them so that they understand, the potential jobs that they can get if they make that selection and the type of student that might like one type for versus another. So I think it's both the training on the counselor side and exposure on the student side. Thanks for highlighting that because I I think anecdotally, I hear comments about counselors just not having, let's say,
the bandwidth or something. There's a lot of students, a lot of demand, a lot of information, and and what what needs to what needs to be true then in in our district for our counselors to be enabled to to expose our students to the kind of information they need to make these choices. Mhmm. I'm not sure that I'm asking for the right information to understand that. And if if as we move towards, our budgeting, you know, discussions that we'll have in in different meetings, right, are are we putting enough energy in the areas where students are gonna be supported to make these kinds of choices?
Mhmm. Yeah. Yes. And I do think we have to we do the the continuous training and exposure on both sides is something we're continuously working on and investing in. Anybody else? President Kamala, just one one comment I wanna ask. I know when we track, reading and math, we're breaking it down between PUA and NES. If we can move forward, also have that breakdown for this particular piece, usually, I'm the one that submits that question. But if we could have it here as well, that'd be helpful. The NES PUA breakdown? Yes. Oh, in the In for for for this particular progress model. Oh, great. Yes. Not a problem. Just a, follow-up. As as,
we were discussing, I I wanted to just also highlight one more point on alignment and and this is is, around so my son in elementary was in IB program, middle school, IB, high school, there weren't really many options. And so, it really wasn't part of our selection criteria because it wasn't as prominent, to some of the folks points earlier. I think it's important though that, we consider and begin to think early about the implications of that as we line
up, all of our magnet programs and ensure that students continue to have access in multiple areas. You know, we've we've looked at the data and we can see that, like, the high demand programs for HISD are those critical dual language programs. Montessori is right up there. IB is right up there. We're getting a lot of demand in school choice. So it's also important that we think through that continuum, through graduation, for these. And I just wanted to bring that again to the fore,
as we continue in the process of aligning programs. Thank you. Great. Well, Thank you. Great. Well, thank you, so much for your presentation and answering the questions. And I will point out again that there are questions online, for the public to look at, whenever you want. Do I have a motion to accept the board, monitoring update presentation of goal three progress measures three point two and three point three. You might have to get your computers going again. Okay. So we have a motion and a second. Are there any questions or comments? Any more? Okay. Great.
We'll go ahead and vote then. Okay. We have nine yeses and, zero nays. The motion passes. Superintendent Miles, I believe you're gonna, address the, mid year academic progress and the teacher excellence system for school year twenty twenty five, twenty twenty six. Yes, sir. Members of the board, President Campo, I'm here to talk about NWA scores. I wanna put it in a little bit of context. First, the board member Martinez talked about the good reason Houston report, just now or not not too long ago,
which talks about livable wage. And is this is this on can you hear me alright? Mhmm. And in that report, it talks about our graduates from 2017. Six years later, so 2023, only 27% of all of our graduates, actually 17% of all of our graduates are earning a livable weight. What that, should tell you is that it's there's a high demand, for us transforming the system so that we will break that cycle in the future.
What's also important to note that's relevant to this report today is that in the same report, the reason Houston report, it talks about what you can tell from eighth grade reading and algebra one, as well as other subjects that they focused on eighth grade reading and algebra one. Meaning this, in order to get a post secondary credential, whether that's a bachelor's degree, whether that's associate's degree, or industry based certification, you also have to focus on reading, math in the early grades.
And so one of the things when even even when we're talking about CTE, we talk about what what we what can we do to get that better? Well, we've been very purposeful in ensuring that our not just industry based certifications and CTE credit, but also, academic credit in ACT, SAT, TSIA, IB. Those are all important exams, but it in emphasizes the dual nature achievement and skills. So we have to do both, and it starts with putting kids in the best position to do both,
which means that they have to read, write, and do math in early One thing I'll say is that, a year ago, we talked about the enormous, growth of our students both in, the STAR tested, subjects and the huge historic improvement in our accountability ratings. Meaning, we went from a 21, DNF campuses to 41. At the same time, we went from 93 a and b campuses to a 70.
And I said at that time, even though, you know, it's good to celebrate that sort of, historic improvement, that one year does not a trend made. And that one set of data doesn't make a trend. So we have to have some caution around that. Well, in the last month, we've had two different data points, different tests that also show in tremendous growth and improvement in our academic achievement. Districts in The United States of large urban that had an increase in proficiency on all four exams, whether it's fourth grade math, fourth grade reading, which we did very well on.
And I I think the nation went down in all four, except for maybe math. I think they improved a little bit. And in reading, eighth grade reading, eighth grade math, we improved a little bit, but the nation went down. The state went down. So once again, HISD is an outlier. And this is recognized not only here, but outside of Houston, outside of Texas. We've been getting lots of compliments around how we did or and questions about how we were able to do this in such a short period of time. That's the NAEP. That's the nation's report card,
and that data can be found online, and that's the NAEP's data, not ours, or not analyzed or calculated by us. But what I'm here tonight to talk about is yet another norm reference assessment called the NWA. You know that last year we took it beginning of the year, middle of the year, end of the year. The the district had not taken NWA prior at there were a couple schools that did, but the district is old and not prior to my administration. So this is the second year. So we have beginning of the year data, which I reported out,
and now, middle of the year data. I'm only gonna be brief today. You will get you have this PowerPoint, but you'll get another one if you haven't received it already. But you'll get another one, I think it's 40 or 50 pages, with subgroup data. But all of it points to really good progress. So let me show you, what I'm talking about. Before I do that, I have to caution. In order to say that a district is and the students are doing well or moving in the right direction, no any one exam, can really tell you that. It has to be multiple assessments of of progress to be definitive.
And even on the NWA, that not any one metric is going to be, you know, scientifically, a predictor of success. You have to look at that one test in multiple ways. And with the combination of both the achievement, which is progress monitoring, and other things like the quality of instruction, you can make some general predictions around, are we going to be there? So for example, in the in the district with the principals and the, executive directors, we look at multiple measures. I'm gonna show you three of them but all those together,
it's still not enough. We also have to look at IRT. So, we have an algorithm that that is, you know, back in the napkin. If we've seen med expected growth in reading and math and the quality of instruction, those three things put together is gonna generally give you an idea of whether you're gonna move up or down on the star. There is no exact measure that you that we can give you. We can give you several data points that point to a trend and that point to whether we're making progress or not. So that's what I'm presenting and we we should not ask of any one exam
more than it can actually do. So, let me show you the things that we look at closely, and this is just definition. So we look at three things. Is one. It is an NWA metric. Every kid has a beginning of the year assessment point. Or or if they don't, they have a generalized, target for middle of the year and a target for end of year. And this is set by, NWA. So those are there there's an algorithm that say if a kid scored a 72 in this example, writ points in reading, based on 8,000,000 other kids and their beginning of the year,
test, the the average student is going to hit a 80 by the end of the year. By the middle of the year, they're gonna hit a 76 writ points. That's all it is. So we we want our students to hit that middle of the, middle of the year projected growth target. In The United States, in NWA world, 50% of the kids will hit met expected growth. So we need to do better than that because we don't wanna just be, the same relative to everybody else. We wanna close that gap with the nation's kids,
med expected growth. That's a general number that we we ask our, teachers and principals to hit. And if we hit that, then we we have a general feel that we're making good progress. The second thing we look at is not just growth, and that expects growth, we're looking at at what point can we move the proficiency to the right. Just like this, this is a median, achievement percentile, which means if you start at the forty fifth percentile as a as a group of kids in a school or in the district, can you move it to the right?
In the nation, of course, the median is 50. So no matter how many kids take it, the median achievement percentile among all the kids would be at the fiftieth percentile. So kid at the sixtieth percentile is higher than, sixty percent of all other kids who took the test, and it's behind forty percent. So we wanna move that curve to the right, and and so it's a it's one of the things we'll show you. Are we are we moving it? Are we moving our proficiency to the right? And then the third thing is meets or exceeds grade level proficiency.
This is also an achievement metric, not so much a growth one based on a star correlation. So NWA has enough information around the star that it can correlate the two. So it's projected. It can't predict for sure, but it project whether or not we're gonna hit this level of proficiency on the star exam. It's called projected meets or exceeds grade level proficiency. So the first of the three, MET expected growth, is a growth metric. The other two is an achievement proficiency metric. Alright. So let's look at this is a big picture real quick. How did we do on met expected growth?
And then we're gonna show you by grade level. The district's target is 55%. I told you that already. So we hit 56 in math and 58 in English language arts. Now that says a district as a whole and obviously we're gonna look at grade level here in a second. In science, all grades exceeded 62%, which is huge. We did this during the STAR. We moved that proficiency in in science, and now we're doing it again in, med expected growth on NWA. We we're we're hopeful that that will translate to higher proficiency on the on the
STAR exam. As far as the median achievement percentile, again, we move the needle on every single grade level, two to five percentage points in math and e ELA, and six to ten ten percentage points in science, which is just incredible movement. Keep in mind, in the in the NAEP world, for example, Nate, since we gonna catch up, fairly quickly. And then, gonna catch up, fairly quickly. And then finally, meets or exceeds, across all grades and subjects,
HST improved, its meter exceeds mark. Bottom line, middle of the year NWEA achievement scores and growth scores this year is above middle of the year achievement scores for last year. Again, is that predictive? We think all total. Yeah. Probably pretty pretty good means that we're gonna move up. That combined with the quality of instruction. There are areas that we have to work on still. So let me show you by grade. So first met expected growth, that's the definition again. Just keep it keep it front and center.
And this is what we did this middle of the year. So again, 55 is what we're shooting for. On average, we hit 56. This is math. And you can see in sixth grade, we hit, almost fifty, forty nine point four, and seventh grade 53. I probably shouldn't be the one just to point to the negative stuff. But, we're close in seventh grade. Sixth grade, we're behind the national, number for MET expected growth. Now you have to look at all the data, not just this one, but it does show that there's some work to do here in met expected growth
for sixth grade. And obviously, all of these are this is just one metric. We're gonna look at the others to see where we need to work. This is reading, same thing, sixth grade is a little lower, and so is, seventh grade a little lower, but it's Seventh grade is not anything to worry about. Keep in mind, 51.6 is still above the national average, but, you know, we gotta be beat it more than we gotta be more than national average, we're gonna close the gap. And then science is, is really high. You know, my team and I, you know, know, I I had this data checked three times,
because it's really good and, you know, we wanna make sure we understand not just when we're when we're below, but when we're far above. And most likely, the fact that we're just spending good time in science, especially in fifth grade, for example, we're spending ninety minutes three times a week, but also the science curriculum is a lot stronger and tighter. That's and tighter. That's another reason for the the growth. Alright. Preliminary median achievement percentile, this we still are working on making sure we have accurate data. This is this, we still are working on making sure we have accurate data. This is closer. This is the second preliminary.
So we're pretty confident in these numbers but, we still have some sped students who who took the test late. We have some late testers. So So it'll be off just a little bit if at all. So we we think we're confident presenting these numbers. Again, this is what it looks like. We're trying to move that percentile to the right. By the way, for those of you who are a little bit more technical, the data for any one district is not a bell curve or usually not a bell curve. It may look like this, and that's why we're that's why the median is still the best metric versus an
average. So the median for math, reading, and science for the district is, well above where we were last year. That's moving the needle quite a bit. Yeah. That's that's good for our students and and when you're gonna when you get the subgroup data, you're gonna see our, so here's here's it broken down by grade. This is math. This is the achievement percentile calculated by NWA, not us. Anybody with access to NWA can look at it, but that's huge growth. That's middle of the year to middle of the year.
So a huge achievement percentile. So we were behind the national average, and now we're generally above. Then this this is reading, also really huge. Again, behind the national average, and now above. So we're look, we're still we've still got a long way to go. We're behind, the state average. We were behind the state average. We're in STAR. We're behind the national average in STAR or in NAP. So, this is gonna get move us closer. This is gonna move us closer. And then finally, this is science.
Like I said, it's ridiculously good. I think that's a word younger people use or maybe maybe they don't use that anymore. But, but anyways, it's really good is is what this chart shows. So that's the achievement percentile, and then finally, projected meets grade level and above. Again, this is this is not predictive, but it is, progress monitoring and it suggests a trend And it it suggests where we might fall relative to star, it's projected. And here's what here's the difference between last year and this year. So we're projected relative to the other kids in the state to move up,
and that's what that's what it's projected to be there on the right hand side. So not much higher in fourth grade math, but overall three points, is a good movement to the to the right on proficiency. This is reading, not as high, still close to three. Again, in this case, fifth grade math is only a point higher. And then science again, this is moving. So when you look at the the data, the three different areas, all of them are trending in a good direction, put it all together, add the quality of instruction, and we think, you know,
the the store results and our accountability ratings will be enough, will be positive. Is it gonna be positive for every single school? No. This is a aggregate district that the elected trustee was is right. You have to also look at subgroup data which you will get, and look at the data by school which which we have. So right now, principals are getting this. They will look at these same metrics but for their school. So every school is a little bit different. Some schools have, you know, have some things to really work on. And then,
and then others are are are doing well and just need to stay the course. That's it. Who has the first question? Thank you, superintendent. I I believe I'm well versed on the frequency of the STAR exam and, NWEA, the frequency of that. Can you remind me of the frequency of NAEP? Yes. NAEP is done every two years, and I may have I may have given you a little brief, background on NAEP. And we we had a hundred schools involved, a hundred and eight schools,
I believe, involved in the NAIT, and it's randomly selected. And that was done not this last month, in January, but a year ago, January. I have a question, about science. So, I mean, outstanding results in science. I'm looking at this last slide. The reason you've identified these two is because those are star test years. Yes. Sorry. I didn't bring that up. Yes. These are the two stars. So that's why there's a correlation, you know, between fifth and eighth. We don't have correlation for the others, because there's no star. Did you On this particular metric. I know we don't have the the broken down between PUA and NES schools information,
but was there a larger, improvement on science Yeah. I can from one or the other? I can tell you, when you get the the results, I don't have them in front of me, but you're gonna see that, as the NES schools did last year, they continue to outpace the PUA schools on growth. Sure. The PUA schools continue to be, above the NES schools on proficiency, on, at where their where their proficiency level is. And in this case, I do believe that the same thing applies, in science. And so I know I know you mentioned a couple of things that have been
in the the HISD curriculum, we started LSAE in science this year, meaning it's ninety minute class, it's a forty five minute direct instruction, 10 DOL, and then differentiated instruction, rest of the period, for the rest of thirty, thirty five minutes. That model worked the first year for reading and math in elementary middle, and it's it's working here too. Still, having said that, the the PUA growth was also good, in science, and that we attribute to, strong curricular design and the curriculum department helping both the HISD curriculum,
but it is in the PUA, schools to write better curriculum and lesson plans in science. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you. Same lines as, board member Audrey. You know, we we we had challenges with reading the star last year. Are we confident that this change will get us to where we need I think we were our goal was 42%. We were at 40%, for third grade reading, for third grade reading star. How confident are you that this percentage change is gonna get us to that to that base for third grade reading in particular? Yeah. So, again, I I feel fairly confident,
but, again, it's not predictive Right. That we have to look at all of the things, surrounding it. So we feel pretty good about it, but there's other metrics that we look at when it comes to third grade, like dibbles and fluency, or the five components of literacy, and the quality of you know, are weak in their quality of instruction, I I I have less less confidence in. And we we will report out to you the IRT scores, not not in, not at board meeting, but just a report to show you where that that is. Keep in mind too that third grade,
relies heavily because it's the first, year of STAR on our kindergarten, first, and second grade program, which we, you know, which I have said is not as strong as it needs to be, and we need to continue to do good work there. And we need to continue to expand our pre k. So it is cumulative, and then all of a sudden, we need to continue to expand our our pre k. Since it is cumulative and then all of a sudden you get a big jump from second to third grade. So, I I feel that there's a lot of indicators here to suggest that we're gonna move the needle on third grade this year. Yeah. I'm just I wouldn't go to Las Vegas and bet,
you know, my house. Alright. And and same thing I, you know, just congratulations to you and your team for working and the teachers, specifically the teachers to work hard to increasing these, these metrics. And I appreciate what you're saying, superintendent, that we haven't we haven't made it there yet. It's small increments, small changes. And so from a board perspective, the the numbers that we've been given are are are good. Yeah. Anybody else? Go ahead. Thank you for the information, superintendent. I'm curious. Is the scale the Ritz score scale that, is on a few of these pages, what does that represent?
The Like, I see one seventy to one eighty four. Can you tell me what that represents, please? Yeah. It it is a number that is created by NWA to put all, kindergarten through, tenth grade students on one scale. Mhmm. And it's a it's a it's a scale that they created. Mhmm. And so, you know, there's a there's a RIT score. And so, it if for example, in four in fourth grade math, I I believe a kid needs to move 12 RIT points in one year. Generally,
that's what a a kid does in fourth grade. So that's, the writ scale. So every grade level has a higher and higher writ score that a kid is supposed to target. Mhmm. And and the the writ the the scale is different for every grade level. Is that what you said? That's right. Okay. Okay. And and I'm asking that question because I know we've had conversations about, you know, first year growth was amazing. It's gonna be harder and harder to duplicate that. We'll have to rely on the knock on effect of the pipeline of kids coming through stronger and stronger. So I'm wondering at what point will we start looking at where we are on
the on the Ritz score scale. Right? Because, you know, again, if we start seeing a decline in growth, maybe to your point about some of the other schools, maybe that means we're closer to achievement or proficiency. So I I think you can rely on MET expected growth as a measure that looks at the Ritz score. Because that MET expected growth, like that, you know, the the chart that I showed, shows that it's it's tied to a risk score. So a kid could a teacher or a student could look at their Ritz score here and see if they met expect growth.
So in this case, in this example, for example for example, this student, their med expected growth is one seventy six. So that's four rip points from the from their beginning score. Mhmm. And so, I think teachers and kids look at that. We also have, another metric that they can look at that I didn't talk about tonight, but it's it's about how many grid points they grew in a year Mhmm. Relative to what they're supposed to grow by by the end of the year. So I think that's one measure. The the point is still well taken that over time,
it's not so much about growth, it's about achievement percentile. And that's why we look at both net expected growth, achievement percentile, because we, you know, you can grow all you want, but if you're still at the thirtieth percentile, that's not competitive. And that may or may not get you into the college you want or in, industry based certification that relies on math or Mhmm. Engineering skills or anything like that. So we have to look at both. It's important to recognize students and teachers and schools that grow because we were behind.
Mhmm. And so it's unfair to just say this is your percentile and you're way behind. Mhmm. Well, if you're growing, that's we're gonna close that gap over time. So you're right. We gotta look at that and the achievement percentile over time is gonna become more and more important. Mhmm. And the, meets and exceeds grade level proficiency is more and more important. Mhmm. Thank you. Well, I'm excited for our students and, the I mean, Ritt Lars, I'm I'm just elated that we've got a large number of students performing at a
higher level. They're growing and learning and and that makes makes a big difference in their, how they feel about everything. And so it's exciting time for for a large swath of our population. We've gotten some numbers from now, NAEP, the nation's scorecard. We've got numbers from, NWEA and MAP, and they're telling us that the numbers are improving. And we've been a district for a while that has been behind, and and we're catching up. And I'm excited about that that for our students, our our parents, our teachers and staff. And so,
I raise a glass to each of you all in the leadership team, as well as, to the teachers and the students who are doing the hard work on the ground. It's a testament, to, what what, has been installed. And now I think we have to really stay focused on growth, and sustainability of that growth and closing those achievement gaps, as well. But what I'm seeing is just this is one of the times where I'm seeing all all boats rise, and it's not it's not just black students or just Hispanic for for every student, in H ISD.
Thank thank you for raising that, board member Vaughn, because this is hard, hard work. And, you know, this means our teachers and our principals are really, you know, doing the work that they need to do to help our kids and that the kids are applying themselves. And just anecdotally, just there's lots of stories. When the NWA test is given, we have lots and lots of stories of kids turning to their teacher and said, I got, you know, I grew 12 rip points. I grew 20 rip points and, you know, and they may not know what a writ means,
but they knew what their target was. Was. So, what the what the divisions did this last NWEA in most classrooms, students had a a piece of paper that showed where they were at the beginning of the year and where their target was based on the NWA. And, you know, and then they they they get their score right away. Students get their score almost immediately, you know, within minutes. The school will get theirs within twenty four hours, and the district gets theirs within forty eight. And then we have to I mean, we got so many data points.
We have to put it together. But, a kid will know, hey, I did this in science, and and there was lots of celebrations, and teachers too, who are really excited about what their kids did. Because they know they they can see what the target is, and then they can see what their kids did. So thank you for for raising that. Again, we you know, There's there's so much work to do, but it's it's good to just stop and say, the kids did well on this exam. They got a lot more to do. Yes. But you know what? For a moment, let's just celebrate. Well, I just finished then.
Long term success requires small successes all the time. Oh, you can never get to long term success. So I only have two words. One is this is word I would use instead of the one you were using, and my word would be awesome. And my second word my second word would be congratulations. Great job. I think you have another presentation now? Teacher's excellence? Yes, sir. We do. And if if you don't mind, I will call up Alyssa Murray, to do the teacher excellence system. We're gonna switch com computers here.
You're okay with this one? I know. Let me know when you're ready. Okay. Alright. Alright. Are you all ready? Okay. Thank you all so much for giving me the opportunity to share a little bit more about TES, the teacher excellence system, which is the new teacher evaluation system we're proposing for implementation starting in the fall, and you all will have a chance to vote on this initiative in March. So we wanted to just take the time to make sure you all had some information here, what we've been doing, quotes here. The quality of the teacher is the single most important school based influence on a
student's academic achievement. No district can significantly improve academic achievement or student success if it does not know who is teaching effectively, and if it does not have at least some degree of accountability for teaching effectively. When I read this, the point is clear to me. When we think about moving the needle for our kids, you all have seen a lot of results today. The successes that our kids achieve are results today. The successes that our kids achieve are because of our teachers. It's because of the work that they're doing in the classroom every single day.
And so we have to have an evaluation system that recognizes those teachers and ensures that, we know who they are, right, and that we're supporting them along the way. We're engaging in whole scale systemic reform as you know. You've you've heard about these six levers, before from superintendent Miles. And you'll notice that evaluation and accountability is a critical part of the whole scale systemic reform. I wanna just just pause and note here that for us, evaluation is our opportunity to really clearly define what success looks like for teaching at
HISD. Right? It is it's our bar. It's clarity. And, you know, another quote I'll just read, if teacher evaluation is disconnected from or has little meaning to the rest of the system, then that misalignment will cause dysfunction throughout the entire district. Right? So we have to have a bar for our teachers and a clear expectations that align with the work we do all year round. Right? The work we do with instructional strategies and practices, high quality instructional material materials, coaching, support, we have to make sure that evaluation is part of that system and aligned.
So when we started this work, we had a clear charge. We wanted to build a locally designed teacher evaluation system, and this is something that many districts in the state of Texas have done. And this system needs to define what teaching excellence looks like at HISD in two primary ways. One, it has to remain anchored in student outcomes. Has to be anchored in student outcomes, student growth, student achievement, and also the quality of instruction happening in our classrooms. And second, it has to be a system that reinforces what we do every day at HISD
and what we believe. So I wanna start with just sharing two kind of anchoring pieces of of information that we took when we started building out this system. First, right away from the beginning, we said, we're gonna hold the strengths of the current evaluation system. We currently evaluate teachers using t test. We're gonna hold the strengths of those system of that system constant in this new system. So you can see, this is our current t test system. We currently evaluate teachers based on student achievement and quality of instruction,
and that will never change. Those are the most important pieces. We also, made some very clear commitments to you all. Through the DAC, through a lot of collaboration, you all passed the district of innovation plan in December of twenty twenty three. And in the district of innovation plan, it very clearly lays out our marching orders on this particular initiative. We promised and we committed to community input, collaboration, relying on evidence based practices, hearing from teachers and leaders, and having them be the ones driving this work. And it's been a very,
you know, a big honor for me to be able to lead out on that work with our teachers and our leaders. So I'm excited to share kind of how we've done that. So this this slide just kind of goes over the timeline of where we've been, and where we're going. I'll highlight a couple of things here. After the DOI was approved, we began our research scoping, started talking with the DAC. A big highlight was in August of this past year when we kicked off the trailblazer program. We realized really early on that building this system would require board.
We needed people to tell us really straight, really board. We needed people to tell us really straight, really directly what's happening on the ground and how we can make it better. So we asked all principals. We gave them the opportunity to opt in to becoming a trailblazer campus, which just meant that they had to commit to giving up a few hours of their month as a principal to come meet with us, view drafts of certain things, give us feedback. And they had to commit to allowing their teachers to be involved in that as well. We have a monthly teacher group trailblazer group as well.
And that has just been an incredible program. We've really, really gone deep with these people, and their feedback has directly led to changes for TES, but also changes we've already made for this year. So I thank them so much. Couple other highlights. In November, we, gave a district wide survey about teacher evaluations. We're able to hear from a majority of teachers and leaders. And then in December, we launched our TES trainer program. In the last year and a half, we've realized sometimes it's really hard to get clear messages to reach teachers.
We wanna make sure that they have the right information, accurate information, clarity. They get their questions answered. And it's it's hard for, you know, them to not necessarily have someone they know and trust already that they can reach out to if they have questions. A teacher might not email me, although some do, which is great. But, they they I I think they would prefer to ask somebody they already know. So what we said was we're gonna have one person at every single campus be a TES trainer. They're gonna meet with us every single month and get intensive training on the system,
and then go back to their campus and redeliver that message, hear feedback from their teachers, pass that feedback on to us, and repeat that cycle every month. So we started that program in December, and that's been that's been really successful and phenomenal for us. In January, couple of highlights. Teachers had their first TES talk on their campus, which is where the TES trainer comes and gives a TES talk. And we had a % of campuses engaged in that process, and we read every single word of feedback, and that was really helpful. Our SDMCs, so our campus shared decision making committees,
a % of them met and voted on a draft framework. And also our DAC gave recommendations. And based on the majority opinion from the SDMC and the DAC, we released our first draft a few weeks ago. That was very exciting because we can directly say that we went with the majority opinion of what teachers and leaders and community members wanted. This month, we've continued with our cycle. We have SDMCs and DAC giving more feedback on our first draft. We meet with the DAC next week. We've engaged in teacher focus groups.
We've had about 40 so far and have a few more next week. And we will be releasing our final draft in a few weeks in advance of our board vote in March. I've talked about this, but just to to reiterate and emphasize a little bit, we did have 9,028 teachers and leaders who completed our survey, which we were really, really happy about because we can't, we can't say that people have have come come completed a survey if we didn't have a high enough participation rate. Right? So we were excited about that. I mentioned already a % of our campuses engaged in SDMCs and the TES talks,
and the SDMCs and the DAC members made the final recommendation for our first draft. That's about 3,000 people coming together, creating a majority vote on the framework. I wanna actually take a second to just say thank you, to the people who have led this work, which I've had the honor of of partnering with. So if if you all would be okay with it, I'd like to share just a quick video and, kind of peek behind the allow you guys to see behind the hood and and hear how this has been happening. Hi, teachers and leaders. We are so grateful for you all and your support developing our proposed teacher excellence
system. After months of listening, refining, and working alongside you all, we are standing at the threshold of something truly transformative for HISD educators. I'm excited to learn about the new teacher excellence system. We're able to ask questions. We're able to retrieve information, discuss it, make suggestions, and, give, plenty of feedback. We're able to take these things back to our campus and have talks with our teachers. And then they ask questions, and then we submit even more feedback. So this is a holistic process. Everybody is involved. I feel more trust in what we're doing because I feel like the account accountability
is really going across the board, and it feels like they really are taking into account our voice as teachers. The transparency, makes me feel more trust in in this system. Teachers have input not just with this process, but also what's happening on campus. They're not just being told what to do. They have an, they have a voice. This process is not only happening, you know, in the larger schools, but it's happening from smaller schools up to, schools that have, you know, lots of students. These sessions are making me feel more more comfortable in us bringing this to the board and
saying, hey. Next year, we're gonna have a really good, evaluation system, you know, a teacher excellence system that was developed by teachers, by evaluators, by campus administrators in a way that was very transparent in order for us to feel confident about what we're doing at our campuses and and bring forth that change. Because at the end of the day, we're all here for the betterment of our students and our communities, and we're only gonna be able to do that through collaboration. And I think that's what the big takeaway is from today and all of these sessions.
From the start, our goal has been clear, to build an evaluation system that is outcomes focused, fair, and truly supportive of teachers. What an honor to serve as the voice and shape the way teachers are evaluated in a year. It's very important for, you know, to have to have the input of the teachers because we are the ones in the classroom, and we're the ones that know the kids best than anybody else. All of us working together, you know, we wanna help the kids, and it's important that every voice is being heard and included and that everybody is,
you know, very important in that part. To every teacher who has filled out a survey, participated in a focus group, asked a question in a town hall, or engaged in a in a TES talk, thank you. Your voices have shaped where we are now, now, and your continued feedback will ensure that TES remains a system that serves, supports, and celebrates teachers. The thanks really goes to them. So, alright. I just wanna now kind of share a little bit about where we are today. So we released our first draft on January 23.
And as I mentioned, the framework in the first draft was chosen based on the majority recommendation from the SDMC and the DAC. And since then, teachers have received a number of different resources and, like I mentioned, have had that campus session with their TES trainer. Those go until tomorrow. So if if any teacher's wondering and they haven't had theirs yet, it might happen tomorrow. But that's an opportunity to learn more, ask questions, and provide more feedback. And then I just wanna highlight a couple of the big innovations that you'll see in the first draft that will continue into the final draft that you will receive
as well. So the first big area is this idea of recognizing the teacher's work outside the classroom. Our t test system currently celebrates student achievement, quality of instruction. We know there's a lot more to what makes an effective teacher. It's a complicated thing to be a really effective teacher. Right? And so one of our pieces we've really been excited about is building our HISD specific planning and professionalism rubric. And we've done that with our teachers. All SDMCs right now are reviewing every single word and giving us any last feedback on it.
But this rubric actually lays out the HISD specific, needs to make sure that teachers are prepared to teach effectively in the classroom. We know teachers spend a lot of time outside of classroom preparing for their lessons, and we wanna honor that, by giving them points in the in their evaluation for that. Additionally, the distinguished teacher review is a way for us to specifically recognize our top 20% of teachers. What we find is typically the teachers who are driving student outcomes,
having amazing lessons, are also the teachers who are staying after school, tutoring kids, volunteering on the weekends for sports, clubs, all of these other items. And we wanna make sure that those teachers are celebrated for that. So the distinguished teacher process is a way for us to give essentially extra points in the evaluation for those folks. The second big innovation is just ensuring a calibrated evaluator for every single teacher. So we've been, using the spot form since the beginning of,
mister Miles' time at HISD. And, through this process, I think we've had a lot of successes, but we have a lot of areas as well that we wanna improve on with the TES system. So first, in a system this large, 273 schools, no matter how well we train, no matter how clear our division chiefs are, we know there are gonna be some moments where someone doesn't operate with superintendents intent. We know there's gonna be times where a teacher experiences something unfair, and and we know that's that's real, and that's true, and that's valid. And so with TES,
we've added a very streamlined process for teachers to elevate any concerns that they're having with their evaluation. Additionally, we've heard a lot of feedback around the number of spot observations that are being done in the teacher's classroom. It is super important that teachers receive coaching all the time. However, it doesn't necessarily need to come with a score every single day of the month. Right? That is overwhelming. That is exhausting. So we've actually set a maximum spots per teacher at four per month.
And we know there were some teachers who are getting far more than that. Additionally, with the TES evaluator certification training and assessment, assessment, we will actually be requiring all TES evaluators next year to prove that they are calibrated on the spot form and that they can, evaluate a teacher's classroom fairly. To give teachers a fair, equitable experience. They have to be able to pass that certification to be an evaluator under the TES system. And lastly, we know there's a need for more resources.
People wanna see exemplars. What does a 15 look like? What does a 14 look like? What does success look like in an IB classroom? What does it look like in a special education inclusion class? So we're working on building that video library and resources as well. Third, we're thinking about valuing a teacher's contribution to campus level goals. So based on the majority opinion, we've added campus action plan into the teacher evaluation system. And let me just talk about what that is, really briefly. Right now, principals, at the beginning of the year, draft an action plan for their campus.
These are the specific goals that they want their campus to reach and achieve by the end of the year. It could be that at their school, they need to work on staff culture, or they need to work on serving a specific population of students, or they really need to work on, you know, a particular subject or something like that. So the principal works with their executive director to draft this action plan. And then at the end of the year, depending on how they do on the action plan, if they meet their goals that they set out to achieve, they receive points for that action plan on their principal evaluation.
Now teachers at their campus will get those exact same points. And, actually, research shows that when folks are held accountable to a collective goal, when everyone's working towards something common, it's more likely that that goal is achieved. Right? So this is good for our good for our teachers, good for our kids. And then lastly, measuring growth and achievement for all subjects. We already measure growth and achievement pretty well for a majority of our teachers. But for our group f teachers, who a lot of times are elective teachers or any teacher without a national,
state, or locally normed assessment, they currently write their own metrics for student achievement. And that just creates a lot of equity issues, a lack of clarity. It's hard to know what the best way to write a a metric is if you're, you know, a fourth grade art teacher. And so what we're doing is we're building a menu of indicators. Those are deep in focus groups right now. We've had focus groups with, you know, the art teachers, the PE teachers, the CTE teachers, everyone who's gonna be on this menu to get their feedback. And then next year, we will say,
okay. Here's a list of approved men of approved metrics. Work with your appraiser. Choose the one that makes the most sense for you. So that, is really all I have to to say. I wanna turn it over to some folks who, are a lot closer to the work than I am. They're on the ground doing this every day. And these are, from my my trusted adviser group, my trailblazers. So we have principal Gutierrez from Herrera Elementary and Valkeith Winters from Millby High School. And they're just gonna say a few words. Hi. Good evening. Thank you so much for your time.
I just wanna thank you all for the opportunity and Alyssa and her team for coming up with this idea of the trailblazer, committee. And the way I'm gonna take you back to the beginning. It was at a principal's meeting, and she spoke about it. And I said, this is a perfect opportunity. I am a first year proud principal at Herrera in the North. And so I said, you know what? This is a great way for me to get my staff involved and invested. And so I pitched I signed up, and I pitched their the idea to them, and I gave them the opportunity to,
you know, voice, and they said, let's do it. You know, this is this is the time. Why not have our voice heard? And so every time there was a meeting, we would I would gather the information, take it back to my team. We would talk about it in PLCs. Everyone had the opportunity to voice, to share, and to give feedback. No excuse as to why this didn't happen or I didn't have the opportunity because you did. Right now at this current time, we have a ton of focus groups going on. And so I took that focus group list,
and I sent it out to my staff. So I encourage them, hey. You're part of the team, the teachers that operate under an SLO, so you need to go to this focus group and share your concerns, anything, ideas, and it's just been an an awesome opportunity. One of the things that my team has truly, enjoyed is giving that feedback and also having our teacher our teacher trailblazer. She also attends meetings. And so if they didn't feel comfortable sharing any feedback with me, miss Velasquez, our trailblazer teacher, was there to serve as that,
teacher to bring back that feedback. Good afternoon. How are you doing today? I am Val Keith Winters. This makes my twenty fifth year as an educator. So, yes, my principal did. She was like, hey. I have something that you'll be very interested in. And I was like, okay. I jumped on in. But once again, twenty five years, you're a little nervous because I have been to so many meetings where they say we're gonna do this, we're gonna do that, and it does not happen. But this one was different. We went into this meeting,
they said you can be yourself. You can you don't have to agree with everything that's gonna happen inside of this room. We're gonna have, some going back and forth. And it happened like that. But when I went back to my campus, the things that we talked about in a meeting, it showed on campus. So if we put together a survey, the exact survey that we voted on, it was actually on my campus now. And I was like, wait, that never happened. I done been in a lot of meetings. That has never happened. So this trailblazer committee is actually making things happen,
and we're actually going in the right direction. And I know that we're going taking it step by step by step, but if y'all can just continue to work with her and and keep pushing her, y'all gonna see some great things going on. Thank you. Thank you. They're amazing. Thank you so much. That's all really we have for you guys. We will be releasing the final draft in a few weeks, and you guys will get it. You'll be able to review it, and then be able to to vote on it in March. So that's that's all I have for y'all, and I'd love to take any questions. Great job. I I was,
fortunate enough to attend a trailblazer session, and it was it was just the way they described it. It was collaborative. It was there are lots of different opinions, and they they, they they created a great space and a safe space for people to say, no, I don't like this or no, I don't like that. And then they came together, and it was it was really special seeing all those, you know, folks, do that. Questions? I don't have a question. More of a, thank you. Thank you for collaborating with those that matter, that those that are gonna be in some way impacted, very, you know,
in a very big way with this. That's important. And thank you for bringing them to us so that we could hear firsthand what they're experiencing. And I love I Valky, I think that's his name. I love what he said about kinda been there, done that. Yeah. Never happens. And the fact that this is truly happening, I can see the excitement in both of them that that what they're doing and the time that they're spending on this committee is really coming to fruition. So thank you for that. Thank you. Thank you. I'm just blown away, by the engagement and the collaboration
and the fact that this is best practice, but also you're building culture at the same time. So I wanna name out what we're kind of feeling, and I really appreciate you taking methodology and systems and people and using this as an opportunity to build culture for all of us, like, with the community, with our campuses, and to get some positive excitement. Just really, really, really excited for teachers and for us. Thank you. Yeah. Just to echo board member Angie. You know, I I work in an organization with 27,000
employees, and every time we roll out something, it's important to get, stakeholder feedback. This is a perfect example of collaborative stakeholder engagement that I love seeing in our district. And and, you know, going forward, let's continue the momentum to making sure that we engage the most important individuals, in the in the areas that are they're being impacted. Thank you. I'm I'm glad you you said that that one point in particular around let's continue this because I think we felt the same way. Through this, we've actually had a couple things pop up that are kind of related to TES
but actually kind of not, but are really good pieces of feedback, and we've been able to connect the trailblazers and some of our other teachers with the right people in central office to get feedback. And and we're hoping to continue this TES trainer program because we have to make sure that what happens on the ground implementation wise is what we designed. Right? Thank you. I I will let go all of this. I I think one thing that, I hope you can raise up a bit is as as parents and guardians of of and caretakers of our our students in the community,
this might not necessarily make a lot of sense. Sure. What would you like them to take away from this, to provide some reassurance as we as we transition towards this? Sure. That's a really great question. I think a couple of things. First, I would want parents to know that this new system is a system that is designed to provide clarity to teachers about how to best ensure their students succeed. Right? It clearly lays out the growth we wanna see, the quality the quality of instruction we wanna see,
and it has systems in place for us to monitor and make sure that's happening. So this is a system that not only defines this, but through the monitoring processes and the support processes and the coaching processes, ensures that kids do directly benefit. The other thing I'll say, to parents is, you know, we're still building off of what's already been done with t test. Right? So, you saw that, you know, I think we've made some some great innovations and improvements, but there there isn't, there isn't gonna be a shift in terms of focus on outcomes and quality of instruction.
That's not gonna change. Yeah. And then lastly, I would I would just tell parents that we've made sure to do our homework and ask the people who this is gonna be impacted by. We have parents who serve on SDMCs who've had a chance to vote on this and really get in the weeds on this. So I hope that that that reassures folks as well. Thank you, deputy chief. This was this was a good presentation. I think, just like my colleagues, we're so excited to see the collaboration. And I I have a few questions. I was looking up my school's SDMC notes on this when I was like,
oh, okay. We talked about it. They talked about about it. And so I'm wondering how it looks like we got 3,000 recommendations, I think was the number. 3,000 members, SDMC and DACC members made recommendations on the framework. Mhmm. How did we incorporate their recommendations? What did we do, What things bubbled up that we, you know, addressed? Just can you take us through that? Absolutely. Thank you. I actually might go back to this slide because, actually, almost everything that is on this slide came from things that people said. One thing that that bubbled up a lot is their expectations on teachers outside of
the classroom. And so they when the SDMC feedback we've gotten so far is that we actually asked them, do you want us to use the the current t test? T test has a similar sort of rubric. They we asked them, do you want to use that rubric or this rubric? And a majority said they wanted us to design our own. So that's one thing. I think something that bubbles up is the experience with the spot, form. And so I think what I've heard from SDMCs and from teachers is not that teachers don't want feedback. I I truly believe that they do.
I've heard I've heard that from them. I've met and seen teachers who are super hungry for growth. It's about how it's been implemented sometimes, and just making sure that every teacher has a fair experience the way it's supposed to be designed. And so, you know, we had to to kind of realize, hey, we can train and we can hope and we can our division chiefs work constantly. They're in classrooms or in schools every single day trying to make sure that what we train on is is what happens. But,
you know, we we can't guarantee that that's always gonna be the case. So this elevation process is something that came directly from them. The maximum number of spots, that came directly from them. The certification program, they've given us a ton of feedback on. I'll give you an example. The trailblazers, like a lot of our teachers, have raised some items around the spot. And, you know, in office academics, we do some work on the spot for them. We collaborate, but it's really something that's really led by chief of schools and the and the division teams as well. So we actually asked chief Massey to come and listen to the trailblazer teachers,
and she sat for an hour and listened to all their feedback, and and there was a lot of it. And and she actually then used what they said to make a training that she delivered to principals two or three weeks ago, which is around how do you use emotional intelligence and how as a coach are you actually someone's champion and someone's supporter when you're giving them feedback. And one idea she said really stuck out to me, which was you have to walk into an interaction with with the people you work
with believing that they will be the best teacher that they can be for kids. And if that's not how you're you're treating our teachers, that that is not aligned with superintendent intent. Right? So, I think some of those those pieces have have bubbled up already, and started to to even just highlight and, elevate trainings that we need to do to to support others. So those are just a couple examples. That's huge. Thank you. Along those same lines of training, just thinking personally, sometimes whoever's evaluating me, it's always nice to know how they are looking at me or how they've been
trained or what they so I'm wondering, are the video library and additional resources gonna be available for even teachers or folks who are not going through the certification so they can just get smart on expectations? Yes. I mean, that's I think that's like you said, it's only fair. Okay. Right? That just that makes sense. People need to know what success looks like. They deserve that. Excellent. Thank you. Can I piggyback off of Sure? So, I'm gonna piggyback off of, board member Cassandra's comments and and asking how you incorporated those those,
comments of the 3,000 folks in the recommendations. For me, the the one that was most eye opening, I mean, all of it is incredible. But, when you said there's only gonna be four spot observations, I I I know how big a ship this is that we're trying to turn around and and the magnitude of it. And I know that we stood steadfast on those spot observations, like, you know, this is what we need to do. But that also now from the recommendations and the collaborations shows me that the administration is willing to listen to those that it is affecting and impacting because I was
I was wowed by that. So I appreciate that, and I think, to board member Cassandra's ask about the recommendations shows that you guys are listening and that you made changes, in what we're doing and how we're doing it. So just thank you for helping. Any more questions? Good. Super panic, go ahead. Yeah. And thank you, president Campo. And just to close, thank you for showing the the the team and the and I think the the board and the public and the staff just got a glimpse of all the work that's been going on. It's just a glimpse. And,
you have members a lot of people working hard on this, but none harder than you. I just wanted to thank you personally for everything you do. And you got so many other responsibilities, but, this has been not just a labor of love, but just very well done. Thank you, Melissa. Oh, Melissa. Okay. So, we will now, move, to, the remaining speakers, beginning with those who are in person, for both of the agenda. Well, we've done the agenda. I was gonna do hearing from the community, now. What's that? Oh, okay. It looks like we probably need to recess for about five minutes for a few,
maybe ten. So we'll look back in a second. Thank you, sir. Yeah. No problem. We were all sneaking out while I get into the other day here. Alright. I know. Okay. We're gonna go ahead and get started. We re the meeting, resumes at 07:59. I understand so we're gonna hear, from the, registered speakers, beginning with those who are in person, for both the agenda and the hearing from the community. They will follow by speakers on Zoom. We're gonna call the speakers to the microphone in groups, beginning with speakers number one through 10. We have seats in the front reserved, for the next group of speakers, so please occupy those seats if you're up next.
And please state your full name, before beginning your remarks. We do have some students that are that are here, that are going to speak as well, and we'll bring them up first. So, miss Smith, would you go ahead and start? We'll hear Archer Walter and Rose Walter followed by their parent, Ellen Walter. There was no better place than school. Art, math, science, and social studies are all part of school. But ever since you, my Myles, came around, all you have is trouble. I mean, firing cibarians,
principals, and janitors. My Miles, you shouldn't be proud of what you've done to our schools. So say it with me. No trust, no bond. I didn't know and say it. I didn't know and say it with me. You just said it to that. That's it. Okay. Good Go ahead and pull the mic towards her a little bit. There you go. Okay. Alright. Yeah. Alright. Dear Mike Miles. Dear Mike Miles. I want you to stop firing librarians. I want you to stop firing librarians. I'm honored. I want, you know, to get our library members compass this weekend. Librarians should get back to work and even write down. My parents should get back to work and even wait till last.
Here we go. Thank you very much. You just wait. Does Walter go ahead? Do you want me to just wait until he end? Go ahead. No. Go ahead. Go. You registered to speak as well? Go ahead. Go ahead. Okay. Thank you, Archer. Okay. The one hundredth day of school has come and gone, and my children haven't been able to visit a librarian during that time. That's one hundred days that used to be filled with a librarian that encouraged them to check out a book in English and Spanish every time they visited. The librarian, mister Barrios, was so wonderful that he instilled a love of reading,
and my now second grader is testing at a ninety eighth percentile in both languages. He's gone now, and my kindergartener only knows him because he's just a school parent now. That's a hundred days of fear for the teachers who never know when they'll be observed or berated. It never should have taken a year and a half to get a max of poor scored observations per teachers per month. That's still too much. Let our teachers teach. Let our kids have books. Thank you. Thank you. Greetings to everyone on the board. My name is miss Blackwell,
and I was addressing, agenda item number five about the, schools that have the low star test scores considering them becoming a NES. And I'm saying that is not the solution. If if this school becomes a NES, other schools, they're gonna experience, being in classrooms longer time. They're gonna have less restroom breaks. It's just longer school hours, and it's just a rigorous curriculum. My suggestion is smaller classroom smaller classroom sizes, more teachers' aids in the classroom, and definitely not having longer school hours. So in conclusion,
the schools with the lower test with the lower star test scores, NES is not the solution. Just try to give them all the support and love they need, but no more NES. Thank you. Thank you. If speakers one through 10 could please come to the front row. Is Carmen Nuncio here? Miss Nuncio? She's not here anymore? Okay. Emily Schmidt, you're next. My name is Emily Schmidt. It has come to my attention that some teachers at Bel Air High School are socially transitioning children without parental consent. When principal Michael Neagly was asked by parents to stop, he said that he does not have the power to tell teachers what to do.
My school socially transitioned me without my parents' knowledge or consent. This caused my delusions to worsen, leading me down leading me further down a path of anxiety, depression, and self hatred, as well as creating an emotional separation from my loving parents. The repercussions of this has left lasting impacts on my adult life. As someone who has firsthand experience of this, I urge you to do the right thing and stop using our schools to socially transition children into another gender. It is wrong to teach children that the only way to be happy is by cutting off healthy body parts.
No child is born in the wrong body, and no child should be made to feel this way by teachers at Bel Air High School. Thank you. Michelle Williams, Michelle Williams, followed by Fred Woods, Denise Bell, and Kathy Beasley. Michelle Williams, Houston Education Association. I wanna talk about the targeting improvement plans. I have been emailing you all week, so you all have heard it before. Read the emails. The schools that generally do well in domain three are not doing well anymore. Hence, your comment about historical data.
Look up the data of those NES schools, miss Flowers. So I'm asking you all to vote no on the targeted improvement plans. NES is experimental. It's not research based. And I'll sent to you all of you all the, TA guidelines for these target improvement plans. TES focus groups, I've already, been to two of them. The TES system is horrible. What this lady failed to tell you all, the spot observation form constantly changes. It just changed in December, and she put out a video. Oh, your evaluations are still valid.
That's called Procedure. Thank you. Fred Woods followed by Denise Bell, Kathy Beasley, Christy Brewster, Lorena Dalton. Denise Bell. Hi. My name is Denise Bell. I'm a mom of four. I've had a child in HISD before. I'm also the chapter chair for Moms for Liberty Harris County, and I'm here tonight to speak on behalf of a parent in HISD. These are her words. My youngest daughter is now a junior at Bel Air High School. Within the last two years, we were shocked to learn that the high school was actively, socially transitioning our daughter by calling her by a different name and pronouns.
On the first day of ninth grade, my daughter's theater teacher sent home an information sheet for us to fill out. The second line of the sheet asked for her pronouns. Multiple teachers started calling her by a different name and pronouns. One teacher even went as far as to cross out my daughter's legal name that she had written on her paper and write her chosen name in red ink. This occurred without our knowledge and certainly without our consent. This goes against our Christian faith, the advice of her therapist, and quite frankly, common sense. We met with her teachers, counselors, and the principal to no avail.
HISD is purposely and secretively transitioning minors without Thank you. My name is Kathy Beasley. I think everyone who speaks at these meetings can agree that we are screaming into the wind. We don't labor under the misapprehension that this unelected board will see our point of view, and vote in any meaningful way to slow down this out of control train. We're here because we love our community and school district, and public education in education in general. I'm not sure if any of you even believe what is being said about the improvement of test scores within the district.
You control the narrative. You are the player, the coach, and the referee. This disheartening lack of accountability is insulting to the taxpayers of Houston. The appointed board and superintendent are undemocratic, just as the suspension of the Northside forty five is undemocratic. To protest is American, and we will continue to do so and applaud the parents and students who out. We are undeterred our commitment to save this school district. You are the Philistines, and we are David. Thank you. Good evening. I'm Christy Michelle Brewster, retired school nurse. I see that you all are gonna adopt a resolution to pay the employees that
missed work on our recent winter storm, which I'm sure is standard. Good job. But I'm really here to thank the stand in superintendent, mayor John Whitmire, for facilitating the closing of schools during this recent winter storm. I wonder what it would look like if we had more facilitating as such. As a former school nurse of Davis, now Northside High School, I too stand in solidarity for those panthers, Northside, forty five.
Wonder what we have is sinister chaos if we had possibly mayor listen to me, mayor Whitmire. A municipal school district. Things that make you go, Lorena Dalton followed by Gina Richards and doctor Denise Wilborn. Hello. I'm Lorena Dalton. I'm a first time speaker, here on behalf of my fourth grade daughter at Wharton Dual Language Academy to formally request the resignation, reassignment, or termination of principal Veronica Celedon because she's, her poor leadership,
lack lack of transparency, and her disregard for student and staff cannot continue. Our once thriving school has rapidly declined in just nine months in just five months, excuse me, nine staff members, including experienced administrators and teachers, have left due to a toxic work environment causing stress and anxiety for staff, students, and parents. Also, 13 families have left. More will leave if she remains beyond beyond the school year.
We need to Thank you. Ma'am, thank you. Your time is up. Ma'am, your time is up. Thank you. Gina Richards, you're next followed by the next 10 speakers. Could you please move to the front row? I'm Gina Richards on part of Southeast Texas Brown Berets. Obviously, y'all know where that is and what what that stands for. Who is my question? Who is this for? All through this meeting, I'm hearing numbers and jargon and over 200,000 schools in poverty neighborhoods have no libraries, but the well off schools have libraries and access and beautiful state of the art
schools. What about the Barrios? What about Fourth, Fifth Ward, Second Ward? What about those schools? Where where are our resources for our children? Are we just not good enough for your numbers up there? I don't got all these big words to use up here. I didn't have some PhD college diploma. I'm a human. All these people behind you, listen to them. That's all I gotta say. Thank you. Doctor Wilborn followed by Melissa Garbero, Karina Quesada, and Jessica Campos. Doctor Denise Livings Wilborn, it was interesting to hear just a few minutes ago about the TES that there's
going to be a high bar of accountability for the teachers. I've been in a classroom. They're there. And I'm hoping, I'm trusting that also means there's going to be a high bar of accountability for the superintendent and for every one of you. And but I do wanna congratulate you on your remarkable evaluation score. You got 66.7 out of 100. Well, according to the HISD, federal and state compliance, grading and report card web page,
it's on y'all's website. Because you were under 70, you earned an f. One five. Thank you. Your time's up. Thank you. Thank you. Mhmm. Hello. First of all, stop suspending kids for their free speech. Clear that from those students' records, and you owe them an apology. The current interventions don't work, secondly, and neither does the bad leadership put in place to enforce them. One example is a principal at Wharton, doctor Veronica Celadon. She is not a real leader. Students deserve a real leader. Real leaders don't divide,
put down, humiliate. They don't ruin a successful campus. Real leaders don't have teachers, nurses, and even their own assistant fleeing for safety from their toxicity. Real leaders don't stand firm in their bad decisions despite negative fallout. Real leaders are aren't constantly acting bigger than they are just to protect their ego. Real leaders don't put down their subordinates to kiss up to their superiors. Real leaders listen, learn, own mistakes, and improve. Wharton students, parents, and staff have had enough and want a real leader. Fire doctor Celadon,
and while you're at it, fire my I'm here in support of the 45 Northside students who were wrongfully suspended for participating in the walkout. We should be encouraging our youth to be civically engaged and speak out when they see something is morally wrong, not punishing them. Suspension is a level four offense in the student code of conduct. Walkouts aren't even listed. The closest offense is interfering with school authorities or programs to include boycotts, sit ins, or trespassing. The students didn't engage in any of that, but punishing them for boycotts or sit ins sounds like a violation of their rights. An article stated a small group of students were disrupted to the learning environment.
That's a level one offense. The consequence is not suspension. Tasby says squid schools should look to their attendance and truancy policies when determining consequences for students who miss class due to walkouts. Remember, Tinker versus Des Moines. The first amendment does not stop at the school gal schoolhouse gate. Shame on y'all for not creating policy to protect our kids from the violence being inflicted on our community by ICE. Thank you. Jessica Campos. With the next speakers, please move to the front number 15 through 25. Maria So to,
Mindon Tryon, Deirdre Arellano, and Diana Candida. I come to you today with great sadness. It's unbelievable what poor leadership, can do to a school, to a district. Once upon a time in Wharton, it was, filled with excellent an excellent team and teachers and administrators. And because of one person strike that. It it was such that we had an a rating, the highest level achievement as defined by the independent. It truly takes years to build a good reputation and only seconds to destroy it. Sadly,
in just six months under the direction of the new, principal, it shook our it shook our our community. Her incompetent leadership, her poor leadership skills promote an unhealthy, unsafe work environment, undermining moral and trust. We've lost 13 students in in nine of them. We've lost eight members and one of them in administrative Thank you. Minh Thanh Tran followed by Dhire Dhire Ariano, Diana Candida, Camille Broom. Hi. Mindon Tran. I stand with the Northside forty five. I'm a certified teacher with over fifteen years experience teaching upper level sciences,
including physics and AP physics. I stand before you profoundly dismayed at the implementation of the new education system. It's a program that disproportionately targets our district's most vulnerable communities. It's no coincidence that the 37 schools identified for NES are predominantly in neighborhoods serving low income families and communities of color. The conversion of libraries into detention centers and worksheet factories represents a troubling shift away from genuine learning environments. The mandatory scripted curriculum strips teachers of their professional expertise, and the questionable art of thinking courses are simply a joke.
While superintendent Miles touts NES as a solution to test scores, this approach sacrifices authentic learning for superficial metrics. Let's be clear. This isn't about student success. It's about controlling our most marginalized communities. Vote no on item five. Thank you. Northside High School. Northside High School. Thank you. Northside High School Your time is up. We need to wrap it up. Go ahead. Thank you. Tianakandive speaking on number five. I participated in the sick out and protest last week because NES is a failure.
It's harming teachers and students across HSE and it needs to be abolished instead of expanded. We love seeing our children excited about learning. That's not possible with NES. We love books, not crooks. If you want to improve literacy, bring back libraries and librarians, and allow students to read complete novels at all Houston schools. Houston taxpayer money is being misspent, and mister Miles' claim that his expensive and ineffective NES system works is false. We love teachers, not, tyrannists. I ask that tyrannical principals like miss Zeledon at Wharton and mister Carter at Sharpstown
be fired. These principals don't respect teachers. Their enforcement of the terrible NES system creates a toxic environment resulting in teachers and children suffering and leaving our schools. We love public schools because they help everyone. You are Houstonians. Help HISD by ending NES and firing Mike Miles. Thank you. My name is Camille Breaux. I participated in the sick out because no matter what parents do, this administration never addresses our concerns. Because I'm able to take off work while others aren't. Because my third grader at an NES school is suffering.
Because I love our school dearly, but I don't see how I can subject my children to another year of NES. Because this top down model of compliance breeds a toxic environment filled with dishonesty and more akin to the show Survivor than a school system. And the ones who suffer are at the very bottom, our kids. Because if Miles earns a 66, he gets a hundred and $20,000. But if a school earns a 66, they become NES indefinitely because Alex Elizondo already called parents irresponsible. What's irresponsible is having someone working for the district who is clearly in need of
communication ethics training, trying to shame parents on social media. I'll crowd crowdfund for her training. Thank you. Speakers 21 through 29, please move to the front row. All remaining speakers will start with number 21, Tex Kirschen followed by Ruth Kravitz. Alright. Is this working? Yep. Hi. Tex Christian, father of a top tier H ISD student and a former teacher. Miles, you are what Texans call a real piece of work, a flop, a thief of joy. I used to be a teacher here, but I could not suffer an educational phony,
a bully such as you, who has banned books from schools and replaced inspiration with AI garbage. The sign of your culture of mediocrity. Miles, you are bleeding our city dry like the world's most boring vampire. Millions and millions of dollars are missing under your watch. Thief. Thief. Thief. Thief. Thief. Thief. Thief of joy, and you. Thank you. Your time is up. Thank you. Your time is up.
Mister Ocampo, bless your heart. Thank you. Ruth Kravitz followed by Claudia Rios. Good evening. Thank you for your service. My name is Ruth Kravitz. Today, you banned a grandmother from HISD property for the next six months, even from attending her grandchild's school school events, just for speaking out at a board meeting. This week, you suspended 45 Northside students for peacefully protesting the executive orders and even misled parents into believing their children were expelled last Friday. For two years, you fired teachers for not following error written scripts or for missing days for health
reasons. You told parents that their kids can't read a full book until after STAR, even at non NES schools like Pershing and Pinnock. Is that supposed to be reassuring? To inflate star scores, you blocked 70% of NES ninth graders from taking biology last year, and kept at least seventeen percent of high achieving NES eighth graders from taking algebra in eighth grade. That is why over 3,000 parents at a 60 schools kept their kid Thank you. Removed from the classroom Thank you.
Your time is up. Thank you. Speaker 23, Claudia Rios, followed by Kelly Blicker. Hello. My name is Claudia Perez, and I'm speaking for Adriana oh, Oh, my name is Claudia Rios, and I'm speaking for Adrianna Isquierdo. I want to raise my voice against the actions of Mike Miles and the new education system, NES, which not only under my create an environment that harms our children's education. One of the most alarming issues is Thank you. Kelly Blickery. I had other remarks, but but I'm pivoting. The teachers who are driving student success, who are driving campus success, who are teaching dynamic lessons,
those are the teachers who are leaving. I'm not talking about last year's bloodbath. I'm talking right now, planning their escape from HISD. So thank you for eliciting teacher feedback, for attempting clarity, for promising to harass our teachers just a little bit less. But forgive me as a parent at a school that has been gutted by this administration, where children are bearing the consequences of your recklessness, for waiting to see before I believe. Thank you. And I have a few few more minutes. Brought you all some Valentine's but I guess I'll just leave them right here.
Thank you. Speaker 25, Acacia Rogers Arcos, followed by Sarah Rivlin, Sean Leader, and Nayeli Hidalgo. My name is Acacia Rogers Arcos. I am a former HISD student. I graduated Lamar High School. I participated in an IB program, and I went on to get my master's degree and become a speech language pathologist. I have a daughter in fourth grade at Wharton Dual Language Academy, and I am a first time speaker. I am be I am here on behalf of all of the parents that have built and all the staff that have built a beautiful,
wonderful environment, a Wharton Dual Language Academy. It has been destroyed in the past six months that we have been there. There have been 10 students that have withdrawn, and just recently, one of the most beloved teachers who's had twenty years experience is being put on leave. I am begging you to please cease and desist, stop this horrible takeover, and fire doctor Celedon. Yes. Thank you. Hi. I'm Sarah Rivlin. Forty five Northside students were suspended for protesting ICE raids.
The district stated that a small group of students ran through the hallways and persisted with disruptive activities. But in the student code of conduct, running and disruptions in halls is a level one offense, not punishable by suspension. Parents were told that their students were being suspended for unauthorized protests and demonstrations, a level four offense. Boycotts and sit ins are also classified as level four, meaning every peaceful tactic used during the civil rights movement is now punishable by suspension
in HISD. Mike Miles often uses group punishment such as mass firings to scare adults into submission, but it hits differently when he does it to kids. Four percent of Northside students just missed three days of instruction. Clearly, obedience is more important Thank you. Hello. My name is Nayeli Hidalgo, and I am here, making a statement on behalf of Jessica Campos. I'm here speaking for students, specifically the Northside forty five. Did you know that the North Side Of Houston is one of the most immigrant populated areas in the city?
The students in these communities are living in fear. And not only do they fear losing their teachers, but they also now fear losing their friends and families. Their homes are filled with uncertainty, never knowing when ice will show up to tear their lives apart. On Friday, 45 of a hundred students from Northside High School were suspended without evidence, without written notice, not for violence, not for harming anyone, but for standing up for their community, for demanding to be heard in the middle of this turmoil instead of listening, you all silenced them. Instead of protecting them,
you pushed them out of the place they should be safe. You did you don't get to claim you care about students while pushing them for speak For expressing their fears and expressing their pain, please reinstate these myths. Thank you. Thank you. Your time is up. Thank you. We're ready for Zoom speakers. Okay. Ready for Zoom speakers. Go ahead, ma'am. Pamela Bovlin. Please turn your camera on, and you may begin. We'll come back to doctor Boblin. Sam Bryan, please turn your camera on, and you may begin. One second, my phone was active. Working on it.
Sorry. We're putting my kids to bed. Once again, another month has passed with accountability for everyone in this district except for Mike Miles and this board. Another month passes, and another month goes by without the board exercising his power to rein in the fraud, waste, and abuse perpetrated by Mike Miles. And now we learn of electioneering, constant taxpayers millions of dollars in the pursuit of his doomed effort for a bond the community rejected. We learn that despite a failing grade on his own evaluation, a massive cash bonus goes to Mike Miles.
Our children go without heat, without clean water, without libraries and books and schools, and Mike Miles gets extra money for it for his vanity, his pride, and his greed. And this board does nothing. Thank you. Doctor Bovelin, you may begin. I'm sorry. I'm gonna speak quickly. Vote no on item seven. Should a conflict of interest not recuse a real estate mogul from financing public, schools, unelected managers should not be allowed to sell off properties and use those funds for general operation.
Vote no on item eight. All district employees regardless of salary, hourly, or contract should should be compensated oh, okay. I thought I already did. Sorry. Vote no on item seven. Oh, Doctor. Bovelin, I'm gonna speak quickly. Vote no on item seven. Should a conflict of interest not recuse a real estate mogul from financing public facilities? Thank you. Thank you, doctor Brodland. Victoria Hotman Brian, please unmute yourself, and you may begin. Okay.
Can you hear me? Yes. Go ahead. Okay. I am speaking to you from my children's bookshelf where they actually get to read real books, unlike students in HRISD schools. I am a former teacher. My name is Victoria Halman Bryan. After reviewing the standards for comprehensive improvement plan or your comprehensive improvement plan to close the gaps where you're gonna turn more schools into NES, all I can say is that the NES, will not provide, what the students need except for maybe giving you false data. Watch that. Do you think that AI AI written,
error riddled slides and packets will not meaningfully close the gaps for any students. Students need classroom discussions. They need to to care about their work. They need a teacher who can explain the importance of what they are doing and why they should be doing it. And they need someone who can take the time to do that. They do not need a robot, and they don't need robot written curriculums. Students need teachers who are passionate about their subject, their curriculum, and who can transfer that passion to their students. Thank you. Teacher helps students realize their own agency.
A good curriculum is designed to get them through to their Thank you. Your your time is up. Can you honestly look at this trip? Christine Hurley, please turn your camera on. You may begin. To quote Emerson, the punishment that we are dealt is always in accordance with the harm we have caused. To the board, the only productive positive and law abiding path forward is with the termination of Mike Miles. Until then, I hope for you is for each and every one of you to face the same fate as the community you hold hostage. I hope when you need assistance, you're shown extensive social media posts about millions of dollars spent on centers you can't
access. I hope when you try to read a book, all libraries are closed and the pages are as empty as our beautiful libraries are now. I hope when you go to listen to music, nothing but the silence of our schools fills your ears because you gave my files a raise and a bonus while taking away our extracurricular stipends. I hope your children are forced to go to any of school to list worksheets while adults run them live on differentiated learning when it's truly just different worksheets. I hope your houses are colder, winter, hot and summer, and that we've been watching. This is the HIC you have created.
This is what you've formed for your children into. Thank you. I will stop thinking about it. Orlando Lara, you may begin. My name is Orlando Lara. I'm an expert on citizenship and migration and a property taxpayer in HISD. This week, the ACLU sent me a letter that explains how the February 7 Northside student protest does not rise to a level four offense in HISD. A level four offense requires repeated action, and this protest was a singular event. Students complied with administrators, calmed each other down, and went back to class. No student's behavior rose to a level four offense to justify suspension.
It is okay to admit that. Rather than waste taxpayer money trying to defend against justified parent lawsuits, I want HIC to develop a policy that could keep our students safe from harmful and unnecessary unnecessary ICE operations in our schools. Allowing ICE on campus is educational malpractice and a much greater disruption than a mere student walkout. If you want students to learn from their mistakes, are you willing to learn from yours? Revoke this immediate accident to keep ice out of HIV. Zendaya, a lot of congratulations.
It's time for you to Thank you. Alina Sotelo, you may begin. My name is Alina Sotelo. Your school interventions are not working, and the people enforcing them are causing harm. These are the words of a teacher at Wharton. Fire principal Celedon, the morale among k. The morale among teachers at our school is alarmingly low, and I personally witnessed my coworkers' pain and distress daily. I am concerned with the mental health of our staff and students. Celedon's leadership style is detrimental to the faculty, our students, and their families.
She is undoing the very glue that holds our school together. This year, we have lost nine valuable staff members and it is heartening to hear that many others are thinking of leaving as well, including myself. My mental health and well-being have plummeted working under this principle. Please take action to address principal Celedon. The health and well-being of our students and staff should be the priority, and it's apparent that this cannot be achieved under her leadership. Fire principal Celedon. Thank you. Franklin Tamberillo, please begin. There's a serious pattern of financial mismanagement and conflict of interest within HST from the
top down right now versus Miles' involvement in transferring Texas tax dollars out of state at the expense of Texas children and for the benefit of third futures investors, that requires investigation. Investigation. Third party disinterested investigation. Third futures investors are not the responsibility of taxpayers, parents, and students. As a taxpayer and HIC parent, I'm calling on you, board of managers, to push for a comprehensive external audits of HIC's finances under Miles' tenure. It's been irresponsible with use of tax money. Second is Miles'
spending of $870,000,000 without board authorization. Where are the basic budgetary control procedures? The man board of managers is supposed to oversee spending, but, these things have not, to my knowledge, come before the board. When Miles began as superintendent, HIC had a projected twenty twenty three to four budget deficit of $99,000,000, but a year and a half Thank you. Later, that was the deficit inflated to $285,000,000. No democracy, no accountability, no trust. Sarah Terrell, you may begin. Last month, I said that you were disappointing people.
You arrested me and threw me in jail. Last week, you suspended 40 students for peacefully protesting. You were threatened by activist grandmothers and students. You penalize us to silence us. We are no threat to you and we are not silenced. Now I'm prohibited from all HISD buildings. I can't attend a play or a lunch at my grandchild's school or attend a public meeting. Your attorney's letter sanctimoniously invokes the safety of students.
You look ludicrous and petty. I'm not a threat. I'm a shaming. You're scared. I'm not. We are barreling towards a future in this country when free speech may no longer be free, when speaking out may be subject to just the sort of penalty that you gave me. I hope that you are pleased to be the vanguard of this movement. Thank you. Frederick Woods, please begin. Good evening. My name is Fred Woods. I continue to be dissatisfied by the lack of community engagement and accountability by this
body. To make matters worse, when parents assemble to speak out and protest, as is our right under the first amendment of the United States Constitution, we get responses that call us irresponsible or that that somehow this board or the superintendent have a higher interest in the safety and well-being of our children than we do. This is Black History Month, and the greatest way to teach my child about how people who look like us overcame enslavement, racism, bigotry, discrimination, and pompous people in positions of perceived out who make decisions for us,
not with us, is to get into good trouble. That's the price we pay for positive change. So as long as you carry on ignoring the taxpaying parents, their students, and our teachers, we will wear whatever label you come up with to defend your lack of empathy and poor judgment as a badge of honor. I'd rather be labeled an irresponsible parent that Thank you. Pays my taxes, takes care of my family, and speaks up for my community than any one of you. Thank you. Our last speaker is in person, Brooklyn Longoria. Good evening. I'm Brooklyn Longoria.
Thank you so much for accommodating me for coming late. Mhmm. I'm here tonight to speak to the revision to local board policy about raising the construction amount from 50,000 to a million. That is a very drastic increase and one that I think should give everyone great pause, especially considering this past year's accounting record. It shows that there is, like it needs time and space to grow and improve, and such a drastic raise is really worrisome. And then, finally, we are now February 13. My child's teacher had hoped to include two novels in this year's curriculum.
She has been unable to do so because there has not been time and space, and I think that that's really sad that we are touting this high quality curriculum. But if a high quality curriculum can't include books, the problem is with the curriculum. Could you imagine Kinkade saying no novels in their curriculum? Could you imagine? That's wild. So Thank you. So, miss Smith, are we completed? Okay. Okay. Let's make sure I'm in the right place. So we, are now, we've concluded the hearing of the speakers. We'll next consider actions action items on the agenda.
Board policy requires members to abstain from all discussion and votes pertaining to contracts that might involve a conflict of interest. Board policy BBFA local defines a conflict of interest as any circumstance that could cast out on a board member's ability to act or with total object objectivity with regard to the district's interest. We have three items pulled from the consent agenda, item three and four, regarding the approval of a contingency legal service agreement, and that will be addressed after closed session. For now, we'll address item five,
which is the approval of the 2024, '20 '20 '5 targeted improvement plans for the Houston Independent School District comprehensive support intervention identified campuses. We have a motion. You may have to hit my computer because they're kinda gone to sleep. We're having trouble getting, getting the, computers back up since we were let's see. Hit my computer. We need to log it in, I guess. Yeah. We both need to log in. I don't know if other stupid. Yeah. The the mic computer doesn't work. Oh, here we go. Thank you. Thanks. Everybody good?
I think we're good now. Okay. So, we need a motion. We don't have a have the ability to move. We have the motion up. My computer? Nope. We still are not able to get into the agenda side. No. We aren't. It's just it's just the two of us here. We we have multiple times. I think that they need to be signed in too. Yeah. I don't even get the sign in. Oh, did you move there? Yeah. There we go. You sign me in? I need to sign in We can do this without with just by hands too. Okay.
Now you have my computer. Right? Okay. Yeah. That's okay. That's it. Yes. Just give it a minute. Yes. We need to adapt this. Here we go. Now we have to sign in. There we go. Okay. Is everybody up on their computers now? Besides us? Okay. Good. Alright. So, we we have a motion and a second. How about discussion? Anybody have discussion on this item? Mister Martinez? Thank you, president Campbell. I submitted my questions. They were, pretty much answered. One of the questions I had was related to, the meetings that we were scheduled to have in the month of January and February. Thank you for providing that list. Quick question because I don't know all the NES scores off the top of my
head. So there's 35 identified within the plan. Those are already NES scores. Is that correct? We're not adding more too. That's that's what I wanna make sure. Okay. Thank you. Any other questions? So I just wanna clarify your question because here we have two PUA schools on this list. My understanding of the question was this is not creating more NES schools as a result of this. Is that correct? And then 37. There's 37 total, 34 are NES right now. Or not. Third 34 or 3535. 34, it looks like. Right. So the PUA schools are high school ahead,
Liberty, and Middle College, Gulfton, and the 34 NES, but 32 of those 34 are, have showed improvement in their plan. So that's a distinction within, whenever you're you're labeled this title, you could be comprehensive progress or comprehensive identified. So 32 of those 34 are comprehensive progress, meaning they've already shown this requirement. Okay. So okay. Thank you. Because I it looks like, exit status includes achieving, a higher close the gap domain score than previously at the end of the second
year. So is this year one for these schools even though they've improved last year? Can you explain that? Yes, ma'am. So, if you are comprehensive progress, that means you are identified at the end of '22, '20 '3, and then you've already shown one year of progress. So this means that these particular schools were identified at the end of twenty twenty three. If it's then 32 of them, it meant that they already are demonstrating that they're on track to exit and that they've improved. So even though they are still listed,
they're listed as comprehensive progress because they're on track to exit. You have to be in it for two years. Years. Got it. That that that helps me because I was wondering, so this status was based on, I guess, the last published TEA accountability ratings that If if you are comprehensive progress, you would have been identified at the end of '22, '20 '3 because you would have had to have one year to show progress. We also have comprehensive identified campuses who can be flagged for the first time.
So for that group, we have two campuses that are comprehensive identified, which means they can be identified from the end of last year. From last year. Mhmm. So they would be in their kind of first year right now, and so in those two campuses, there are two NES schools, but one is the first year NES right now, so they haven't had a chance to demonstrate, if, you know, what what those results will be yet by the end of this year. And the second one was an NES last year, so it was the only one of the 34 NES that actually did not make
progress. Thank you. And and one more question, please. Is this an improvement plan that we would do every year based on, you know, I guess, last year's schools? How how does this work? It it typically is. It's a federal requirement that's typically in place, but because of some broader things happening, it was not required by TEA last year. Mhmm. And so, it it was had a one year where it just didn't exist. But usually it does, and we we still actually did the plans. It just was the same requirements weren't in place in terms of it going to the board, and in terms of it going, in front of the campuses.
But even so, I just think the important thing is that every campus is still required to develop an action plan. Action planning process really in the spring right now for the next year. They get significant feedback on that process, as a part of defined autonomy if they have large gaps, which is what this is based on. They actually have to include that in their action plan, and they get significant feedback on that action plan, as they build it now and then also in the fall. And so what we're really focused on is making sure that this just aligns with what they've already been doing in that action plan that they follow,
that really does support closing the gaps. Okay. Thank you. And, I mean, I just wanna acknowledge that we celebrated the growth of a lot of these schools on here. So, again, we expect to see this list much smaller. Mhmm. Thank you. Any other questions? Okay. Let's go ahead and vote then. Okay. We have, nine yay and zero no. The motion pass passes. Let's go on to the, consent agenda. Do I have a motion to approve the remainder of closed session. Okay. So we have closed session. Okay. So we have a motion and a second.
Any questions or comments? Okay. Let's go ahead and vote. The motion passes nine to zero. Okay. At this time, the board will recess to closed session under chapter five five five five one of Texas government code, open meetings act, subsections five five one dot zero zero four through five five one dot zero eight nine. Should the board, should board final action, vote, or decision on any matter considering the closed session be required, such final vote, action, reconvening of the public meeting or at a subsequent public meeting of the board upon
notice thereof. Board has recessed to closed session at 09:04PM on 02/13/2025. Thank you. We got everybody here? Good, good. Okay. The board, good evening. The meeting is reconvened at 10:07PM. Our let's see here. Our Our second item pulled from the consent agenda agenda is item three, consideration of adopting a resolution of approving a contingent fee legal services agreement, including findings, needed for submission of contingent fees cert legal services agreement and the request for the
expedited review by the Texas attorney general. May I have a motion for the item three, please? Okay. We have a motion and a second. Are there any any, questions or comments? Okay. Please vote. You got it? K. Motion passes. Let's see. The the last item pulled from the consent agenda is item four, consideration and adoption of contingency fee legal services agreement with Thompson and Horton LLP, Elian and and Bonin, p l PC, and, O'Hanlon, Demerath, and Castillo p c. Do I have a motion to approve? K. There's a motion, and it's been seconded.
Any questions or comments? If not, please vote. Okay. The motion passes. We don't have anything else out of closed session. So are there any, remarks or reports from board members? All good? I I will. Okay. Go ahead. So, first of all, it's 10:00, so that's good. This week I was invited, by Milby, community to go be part of a balloon release for one of their students who's unfortunately, lost their lives lives recently. I always get emotional on these type of things. For me, it was it was a little bit surprising. So he was a baseball player on ninth grader. They introduced me to the
I I didn't well, let me let me say this. I didn't know the the kid, but I knew his dad when I got there. I was surprised at that. I said I know the kid, but he actually went to church with us for several years. So one of the things that, you know, I I was there. I was reminded that our kids have it tough. You know, it's it's tough to be a teenager these days. So I'll I'll just say this to the families, if you're still watching. Just a reminder that we have resources here available through HISD, through Hazel Health, our counselors. Reach out to your, your school principal for assistance, but, you know, we talk about, and,
you know, Cassandra and I, we we talk to community members and we talk about all the wrap around services that are needed and that we can be everything to everybody. But here's one area where we can help out. And so for parents, make sure you reach out to your school if you need assistance with mental health. So thank you. Thanks. Any other comments or reports? Okay. Well, superintendent, you have anything? Yes, sir. Okay. Great. Well, the next, regular board meeting will be held on March 20, of twenty twenty five. We do in the middle of that of this have a budget a budget workshop on the February 27.
Materials will go out on the twentieth, and, this will be assumptions. So don't expect a baked budget since it's February, but we'll have the assumptions and and a lot of the workings that will go into the budget. And so we'll make sure that that that everybody has that on the twentieth and then we'll, be ready for that, that meeting on the twenty seventh. So, there being no further business, this meeting is officially adjourned at 10:11 p. M. Thanks.