The application period will close March 17. If demand exceeds the $1 billion available, the state will prioritize students based on family income and whether they have a disability. view article

The 89th legislative session has produced a staggering number of changes to the landscape of Texas education. Perhaps one of the more jarring changes was the addition of chapter 26A to the Texas Education Code. This new chapter codifies the grievance provisions that school districts are required to implement in policy. Some of the requirements in the Chapter simply mirror the procedures already common amongst school districts, such as the use of a multi-tiered grievance appeal process. Others, however, depart from the usual grievance procedures or create new procedures entirely. This article will highlight some of the largest departures from past grievance procedures and discuss the implications of these changes for Texas school districts.

A church and coffee shop are claiming the sign requirements violate their First Amendment rights.  Two Harris County property owners are challenging state laws that govern when persons carrying handguns can be convicted of criminal trespass if they enter or remain on property where guns are not welcome.  The laws—Texas Penal Codes 30.06 and 30.07—require the posting of signs with specific requirements on the buildings of property owners that wish to ban handguns from their premises. Property owners may alternatively issue a written notice in the form of cards or give verbal notice to potential violators.  The U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans heard oral arguments in January. view article

Attorney General Ken Paxton has filed a lawsuit seeking to shut down the operations of the Council on American-Islamic Relations and the Muslim Brotherhood in Texas, marking the first major enforcement action stemming from Gov. Greg Abbott’s designation of the groups as foreign terrorist organizations.  The lawsuit, filed Thursday in Collin County, asks a state court to issue temporary and permanent injunctions prohibiting the Muslim Brotherhood, CAIR, and their affiliated entities from operating, fundraising, recruiting members, or engaging in organizational activity within Texas.   “Sharia law and the jihadists who follow sharia law have no business being in Texas,” Paxton said. “I am in full support of Governor Abbott’s lawful declaration that CAIR and the Muslim Brotherhood are foreign terrorist organizations, and it’s imperative that they are stopped from operating in Texas. Radical Islamic terrorists are antithetical to law and order, endanger the people of Texas, and are an existential threat to our values.”  view article

Sara Gonzales exposes a Texas public school for handing out Qurans, hijabs, and pamphlets on Sharia law.  The ACLU has long tried to keep the separation of church and state when it comes to Christianity in public schools, and now BlazeTV host Sara Gonzales is calling on them to have the same energy when it comes to Islam.  “If you try to teach Christianity, if you try to preach the Bible inside the schools, they are right there to tell you how there has to be a separation of church and state. And I’m just wondering, I’m wondering if we will hear the same outrage from the ACLU on this next story,” she says. view article

A current and a former Winnsboro ISD superintendent were arrested on additional charges Thursday, according to the Hopkins County Sheriff’s Office. Brian David Wilcox, 50, and Aaron David Nation, 39, were both held Thursday at the Hopkins County Jail on warrants charging them with tampering with physical evidence with intent to impair and with unlawful interception of a wire, oral or electronic device. view article

Lubbock ISD responded to a threat made against one of its middle school campuses Thursday. While the threat was deemed false, Brian Ellyson Director of student and parent resolution for the district said they take every report seriously. “You know that’s our job, is to make sure our kids are educated and our kids are safe,” Ellyson said. view article

Wylie Independent School District is investigating an incident at Wylie East High School after an outside religious organization distributed materials on campus without district approval, according to a letter sent to parents on Tuesday. "Parents send their kids to school with the presumption that they're going to get a good education. They don't expect to come home with a Quran or hijab on their head," said Jacquez Jones, the Chairman of the High School Young Republicans. view article

A Wylie Independent School District employee is on leave after an incident at Wylie East High School, when an outside religious organization distributed materials on campus without district approval, according to a letter sent to parents. view article

Critics of the nondisclosure agreements say they have protected abusers and institutions for decades.   Cindy Clemishire was 12 years old on Christmas night in 1982 when a traveling evangelist staying with her family first abused her.  According to Clemishire, the sexual abuse continued over the next four years. She eventually told her family and the abuse stopped. But her abuser, Robert Morris, went on to found Gateway Church in Texas, which became one of the largest megachurches in the nation.  When Clemishire sought restitution in 2007, Morris’ attorney offered her $25,000 if she would sign a nondisclosure agreement that would prevent her from speaking publicly about the abuse. She refused. view article

A now-former Overton ISD basketball coach accused of grabbing and twisting a seventh-grade student’s ears, causing significant pain during practice, was arrested last week. Zachariary Joseph Griffin-Guidry, 30, was booked into the Rusk County Jail on a charge of injury to a child/disabled/elderly person on Jan. 29. view article

Former Celina Independent School District teacher and coach Caleb Elliott has officially been indicted by a Collin County grand jury on felony charges. Charges include possession of child pornography, invasive visual recording and sexual performance by a child. Elliott is accused of secretly recording boys in the Moore Middle School locker room. view article

Cypress-Fairbanks ISD leaders say they are following the law — not politics — as the state's third-largest district becomes the latest flashpoint in Gov. Greg Abbott's escalating fight over the Islamic Games and a Muslim civil rights group.  Superintendent Douglas Killian wrote a personal letter to the GOP governor late last week, expressing frustration over his demands for Cy-Fair ISD to cancel the Islamic Games of North America at its facilities and saying he needed to clear up "significant inaccuracies related to this situation."   According to the letter, which the Chronicle obtained Monday, Killian challenged Abbott's demand directly, saying that it would be illegal for the district to discriminate against the Islamic Games and that the group "is not identified as a foreign terrorist organization." view article

A student was rushed to the hospital on Monday after being stabbed at Grand Oaks High School, school district officials said. According to Conroe ISD, a student suffered three shallow stab wounds after an altercation with another student occurred at 9 a.m. on campus at Grand Oaks High School, which is located at 3800 Riley Fuzzel Road in Spring. view article

A Harris County Sheriff’s Office sergeant is facing both state and federal charges after authorities say he engaged in explicit online communications with someone he believed to be a 13-year-old child. view article

A San Antonio resident is asking a judge whether a recent special Judson Independent School District board meeting was legal. The plaintiff, Lisa Butler, is “highly interested in the affairs of the Judson Independent School District, including its Board of Trustees,” according to a temporary restraining order (TRO) filed Jan. 23. view article

The Texas Education Agency confirmed Monday that it is investigating Austin ISD and several other districts following student protests across the state last week. The move comes after Gov. Greg Abbott announced he directed Texas Education Commissioner Mike Morath to launch an investigation into AISD in a post on X Friday. view article

A man employed as an Athens ISD teacher and assistant basketball coach has been arrested and accused of having marijuana and other “dangerous drugs” on campus. The man, who is employed at Central Athens Elementary School, was arrested early Monday morning outside the campus, according to an Athens ISD release. The school said they notified authorities after they learned of a “potential concern.” view article

An attorney representing a McKinney student’s family revealed new allegations Thursday surrounding the arrest of a high school athletic trainer. Personal injury attorney Paul Herz met with reporters in his Dallas office, sharing additional details about the arrest of a McKinney Independent School District athletic trainer accused of sexually assaulting a student. Herz also raised concerns about whether the trainer was properly licensed in Texas at the time of the alleged incidents. view article

A recently elected Schertz-Cibolo-Universal City ISD (SCUCISD) board member was terminated from his teaching position after abandoning several children at a Judson ISD elementary school hours before being sworn in, according to records obtained by KSAT Investigates. view article

The award is the largest the Texas conspiracy theorist has been ordered to pay as part of three defamation lawsuits against him for falsely claiming that the 2012 school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, was a hoax. view article

Attorney General Ken Paxton is demanding information from Cypress-Fairbanks and Grapevine-Colleyville Independent School Districts (“ISDs”). The information demands are part of an ongoing investigation regarding the schools’ ties to the Islamic Games of North America, which hosts events sponsored by a chapter of a designated foreign terrorist organization—the Council on American-Islamic Relations (“CAIR”). view article

A Harris County judge has dismissed the case alleging a Klein ISD cosmetology teacher operated a sex trafficking ring with her son, after prosecutors said they did not have sufficient evidence. Kedria Grigsby, 43, a former cosmetology teacher at Klein Cain High School, was arrested in 2024 and charged with three counts of compelling prostitution of a minor and three counts of trafficking a child. Grigsby was accused of assisting in her son's efforts to recruit teen runaways from the school district for prostitution. view article

Webb County’s sheriff and his assistant chief are facing federal charges for allegedly using office resources to create and profit m a disinfecting business during the COVID-19 pandemic. Sheriff Martin Cuellar Jr., 67, and Assistant Chief Alejandro Gutierrez, 47, have both appeared before a federal grand jury after turning themselves in. Their indictments have now been unsealed, revealing that they both are accused of misappropriating Webb County Sheriff’s Office funds between 2020 and 2022. Cuellar is the brother of U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-Laredo). view article

A former Bartlett ISD teacher has been arrested for allegedly having an improper relationship with a student and for possessing child pornography. According to jail records, 26-year-old Jerod Lee Knox was arrested by the Holland Police Department on Thursday, Jan. 22. He was charged with Possession of Child Pornography and Improper Relationship Between Educator and Student, both second-degree felonies. view article

A Killeen family is approaching two years of a legal battle against the school district. They claim that a teacher restrained an elementary student with autism and mistreated him. The family and attorney say the district refuses to take any kind of accountability which is why the process continues to drag on. However, they say, they won’t stop fighting until they get justice for the young boy. Since filing the case, JW Zepeda, the lawyer on the case, says Killeen ISD has consistently tried to dismiss it. view article

Garland ISD has agreed with a federal motion to release the district from a decades-old desegregation order. Trustees voted 6-0 Tuesday night to seek unitary status, meaning it has met federal equity requirements. Last month, U.S. Attorney Ryan Raybould filed a motion to end the desegregation order put in place in1970, when the majority white district had racially segregated schools. view article

A federal jury in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas, Waco Division has ruled in favor of a group of Marlin ISD parents who accused the district of tampering with student grades and retaliating against parents. Pacific Justice Institute, the firm representing the parents, announced that the jury ruled in favor of the plaintiffs, Monica Johnson, Clifford Jones, Brandolyn Jones, Praiyer Jones and Addai Jones, in a First Amendment retaliation case against Marlin ISD, former Superintendent Dr. Darryl Henson and Marlin ISD Chief of Police John Simmons. view article

Keller ISD’s election system does not discriminate against Hispanic voters, a federal judge ruled as he dismissed a voting rights lawsuit against the district last week. In a Jan. 15 decision, U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor tossed the case and ordered the plaintiff’s legal team — the nonprofit arm of a firm that’s challenged election systems at school districts across North Texas — to explain why they shouldn’t be sanctioned for filing what he called a “baseless petition.” view article

A federal court jury in Waco has awarded $7.5 million to a group of parents who claim they were retaliated against and their right to speak out was trampled on after they protested the planned cancellation of the 2023 Marlin High School graduation. Jurors in U.S. Magistrate Judge Derek Gilliland’s court sided with Marlin parents Monica Johnson, Clifford Jones, Brandolyn Jones, Praiyer Jones and Addai Jones in their First Amendment, retaliation and due process violations lawsuit against Marlin Independent School District, former Superintendent Darryl Henson and district Police Chief John Simmons. view article

A federal judge found the liberal lawsuit against the school district “frivolous, unreasonable, and without foundation.”  In a big win for the Keller Independent School District, a federal judge dismissed a voting rights lawsuit led by left-leaning activists, which had attempted to revoke the district’s decades‑old system for electing trustees as racially discriminatory.  A January 15 opinion by U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor found the suit “frivolous, unreasonable, and without foundation.”  O’Connor dismissed all claims with prejudice, awarded Keller ISD its attorneys’ fees, and ordered the plaintiff to show cause for why sanctions should not be imposed. view article

Jurors deliberated for more than seven hours before finding Adrian Gonzalez not guilty in the first trial over the response to the attack that killed 19 children and two teachers. A former police officer was acquitted Wednesday evening of charges he failed in his duties to confront the gunman at an Uvalde, Texas, elementary school during the critical opening minutes of what would become one of the deadliest school shootings in U.S. history. view article

According to Paxton's office, the current framework has “historically forced Texas kids to receive over 70 shots from birth to age 18” as a practical condition to continue receiving medical care from many pediatric practices. view article

School districts in North Texas and beyond should learn from revelations about poor hiring practices at Celina ISD that have come to light after the arrest of a teacher and coach on sexual exploitation charges. William “Caleb” Elliott, a former teacher at Moore Middle School and a coach in the district, is accused of recording boys in the locker room. The 26-year-old faces eight federal counts of sexual exploitation of children, including producing child pornography. The case has rightfully shaken the trust of parents and families in this tight-knit community in Collin and Denton counties. view article

The Garland Independent School District will vote tonight to end desegregation efforts, which have been in place for decades. What we know: This is a case where a federal desegregation requirement in effect for more than 50 years has outlived its original purpose. And so, steps are being taken to eliminate it. view article