The Austin Independent School District’s board of trustees discussed transition plans for the four schools it voted to close at last month’s meeting at a work session Monday night. Board members asked the district to improve its communication to families and staff. Many said they want school communities to have clear and timely information about their school closing and moving to a new school.

Started as a means to get children engaged with reading outside of class, Sweeny ISD officials have begun reading books to children on social media each week with “Bulldog Bedtime Stories.” “We realize not every family has a library of books,” Sweeny Elementary Principal Michael Heinroth said. That realization prompted Heinroth to start recording himself reading books in brief videos on social media, allowing families not to have to spend money on new books, he said. view article

Having a high-paying job doesn't necessarily mean you'll have job stability, and vice versa. Some college majors that lead to high-paying jobs also come with above-average unemployment rates - and that includes majors in fields like engineering, cognitive science, and the arts. The financial-education company Bankrate found the unemployment rates for college majors, based on the most recent available data from the US Census Bureau's American Community Survey. Using weighted data, Bankrate determined the unemployment rates and median incomes for graduates across 162 majors that employed at least 15,000 people. view article

Eagle Pass Independent School District Superintendent Samuel Mijares announced at a press conference on August 15, 2019 that all schools of the local school district will commence classes on Monday, August 26th, with over 14,000 students expected to attend during the 2019-2020 school year. Mijares noted that all local public Pre-Kindergarten schools will now be providing instruction all day from 8:15 A.M. to 3:30 P.M. as mandated by the Texas Legislature. Parents are encouraged to prepare their young children for attending school during the full day. view article

Austin Independent School District leaders will meet with parents, students and employees to discuss potential dress code changes Wednesday evening. According to our partners at the Austin American-Statesman, leaders want to remove language that unfairly targets female students and specific cultures. The last time the district's dress code was updated was more than 10 years ago in 2007. view article

Temple ISD's 2019 senior class participated in a series of mini-classes on Wednesday called "Adulting 101." view article

Due to expected severe weather this afternoon and evening, all Huffman ISD schools will have early release. Hargrave High School and Huffman Middle School will be released at 1:30 p.m. Huffman Elementary School and Falcon Ridge Elementary School will be released at 2:45. view article

Mansfield ISD is investigating after one of its students posted a video on social media showing them smearing their face with black body paint and using a racial slur, the district said in a statement Wednesday. The district said the video was posted by a Lake Ridge High School student. view article

Two proposals up for votes Monday would expand access to pre-K education for Austin ISD families. The first would use $80,000 in city funding to create up to five new 3-year-old pre-K classes inside AISD schools, expanding the capacity of district early-education classrooms from 1,120 students to 1,350 students next school year. view article

Belinda George, the Homer Drive Elementary School principal who breaks out her pajamas every Tuesday night to read a bedtime story to her students via iPhone video, will be featured on Good Morning America Friday morning. It's the latest media exposure for the Beaumont educator since she was featured in an Enterprise last month. view article

In a Trib interview, Waco ISD Superintendent A. Marcus Nelson expressed remorse for his March 6 traffic arrest for marijuana possession (less than two ounces), an incident reportedly triggered by a Houston-based friend’s suggestion on what might bring Nelson relief for chronic back pain. view article

The Burleson Independent School District is in the race to be the best in Texas. H-E-B named BISD as a top-five candidate in the large school districts category for this year’s Excellence in Education Award. The award is the largest monetary program for Texas educators and schools. view article

Staff at Somerville Elementary sprang into action when their entire school was left in the dark Wednesday. "We had to find some places to have light so they would be able to see their text books,” said Jessica Douglas, a 3rd grade teacher at Somerville Elementary. view article

In Lancaster, piggy banks are helping plant the seeds of college dreams, especially when the school district chips in $50 just to get families started. view article

Mariachi performance is a fully sanctioned University Interscholastic League event for the first time this year — a sign the Mexican ensemble style of music known for its stringed instruments, trumpets and powerful Spanish-language vocals is growing in popularity at Texas high schools. The State Mariachi Festival has been held for three years under a pilot status, but this year’s event in Edinburg later this month means the festival is here to stay. The festival’s status comes as mariachi programs appear to be growing in Texas, where Hispanic students make a growing part of the school population. “We believe that mariachi music is an important part of the heritage of many students in Texas because it is a part of their family heritage,” said Brad Kent, the UIL’s director of music. view article

On Nov. 9 Hays CISD released the draft of its innovation plan, which must be approved by the board of trustees in order to receive a district of innovation designation. If approved, the district would be able to make changes to the academic calendar and to exempt some Career and Technical Education instructors from teacher certification requirements. The district of innovation designation was created by the Texas Legislature in 2015 as a way to give independent school districts some of the flexibility that charters schools have under state law. While becoming a district of innovation can allow for numerous exemptions to curriculum or logistics requirements, the most-used exemption is the one that allows schools to start earlier in August. view article

The spirit of the Big Country was in full effect over the weekend. The Coleman High School band director, Matthew Sowell and wis wife, Jackie, the assistant director were injured in a car crash the day before UIL marching contest in Mineral Wells. "My wife and I were coming [to morning band practice] and it was raining," Matthew Sowell says. "An 18-wheeler lost control right in front of us." view article

As a forensics and biomedical sciences CTE teacher, Luna exposes her students to techniques used in real world law enforcement and crime investigations. Her lessons cover topics related to the collection of evidence including entomology, anthropology, ABO blood typing, fingerprinting, DNA, case studies, hair analysis and ballistics. view article

Aspiring Leander ISD teachers now have the option to earn their master’s degree of education with a specialization in education administration through a unique partnership with Concordia University Texas. The new LISD Aspiring Leader program, which kicked off in May, offers district-specific coursework to groom potential and current LISD teachers for their careers with a distinctly LISD-oriented approach. view article

The Texas Education Commission approved a groundbreaking request Wednesday in Austin from Wichitan Catie Robinson to pay for campaign-related child care with political contributions. The commission unanimously adopted a favorable ethics advisory opinion requested by the Democratic candidate, setting a precedent for state and local candidates across Texas. view article

Eighth-graders in Southwest Independent School District passed their standardized math exams at a rate 8 percentage points below the state average last year — but something different was going on at the district’s Scobee Middle School. view article

Sabika Sheikh finally returned to her family in Pakistan on Wednesday from her months away as a foreign exchange student in Texas. Her father was the first to meet her coffin, draped by a Pakistani flag, at Karachi’s airport in the dark of the early morning. view article

A flu outbreak has prompted the entire Sunnyvale school district to halt classes Tuesday and Wednesday, officials announced Monday. Not only are student absences soaring, but officials also believe kids needed to be separated to prevent further contamination. view article

A JacketRadio.com announcer accused of calling Seguin High football players "Cougroes" and jesting about a cheerleader's weight was fired from the Cleburne sportscast and will not work Friday's game against Burleson, Cleburne school officials told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. Mark Banton acknowledged being one of the announcers for last week's game between the Cleburne Yellow Jackets and the Seguin Cougars of Arlington ISD but would neither confirm nor deny making the remarks, the Star-Telegram reported. view article

Baylor’s Institute for Air Science reached out to Baylor’s School of Education in early February to collaborate in making an activity booklet that would entertain and enlighten children about aviation sciences. The project had dragged on for several semesters, being passed between student workers with the task of finding and creating the activities. Kelley Oliver, the institute’s project coordinator and office manager, expressed her concerns over the dilemma to her assistant director, Tim Compton, who advised she reach out to the education department. view article

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Ector County Independent School District second-graders will be learning how to write in cursive in their spring semester. The State Board of Education decided to move the skill down a grade, ECISD officials said. Assistant Superintendent for Curriculum and Instruction Carolyn Gonzalez said handwriting, which begins in kindergarten, has always been taught. “This coming year, cursive has been dropped down to second grade, so second-graders now have to begin to learn how to write in cursive. That is new.” view article

About 50 Waco Independent School District sixth- and seventh-graders are getting a chance to reduce summer learning loss with the help of Baylor University and a nationally recognized reading program. Two weeks ago, Baylor’s School of Education started Waco’s first Freedom School endorsed by the Children’s Defense Fund. Held at Cesar Chavez Middle School through July 28, the program has deep ties to the 1960s civil rights movement and allows children to tackle controversial — though culturally relevant — topics through debate and book discussions. view article

New student report cards will go out this week that Education Commissioner Mike Morath promises will go a long way toward demystifying content on the state's standardized tests. Groups such as Texans Advocating for Meaningful Student Assessment, or TAMSA, have long advocated for minimizing, or even eliminating, state standardized tests. The agency and lawmakers have offered feeble justification for the tests in the face of rising opposition. Now, Morath will pull back the curtain on the tests. School districts will send student report cards out to individual families next week, outlining what questions each student missed, and why, as well as correct answers and tested standards. The reports, the result of a year of work in Deputy Commissioner Penny Schwinn's shop, will be the first significant effort to explain what the tests are intended to achieve, and how students can improve their performance. view article

UnitedHealthcare recently announced the names of 12 Fort Bend ISD high school students who were selected to participate in Project Search, a job training program created for students living with disabilities. Fort Bend ISD's Special Education Department partners with UnitedHealthcare, Texana and Texas Workforce Solutions to provide the school-to-work program to help young people make a successful transition from school to productive adult life. FBISD's 2017-18 Project Search interns include: Joshua Berry, Bush; Ritika Bhardwaj, Kempner; Nicholas Contarell, Bush; Daniel Hall, Bush; Gary Metz, Dulles; Cody Nguyen, Ridge Point; Ileana Ramirez, Hightower; Nicholas Sparks, Austin; Sara Sugar, Dulles; Divine Tezzo, Austin; Emma Watson, Dulles; and Jacoby Young, Marshall. view article

It is hard to believe that we will officially close the books on the 2016-2017 school year in just one week from today. From our Lake Travis High School National Merit Scholarship Program students, our three-peat state champion girls golf team, to being named a H-E-B Excellence in Education Small District Award Finalist, it has been a stellar year across our school district. As our teachers, students and support staff prepare for their well-deserved summer break, our school board and district senior staff continue to focus on the actions coming from our state capitol as the 85th Legislative Session heads to a close next week. view article

Bill (AKA Mo)  Johnson, Hays CISD superintendent for umpteen years, once noted that of the 16 graduates in his 1947 Buda High School class, 11 graduated from college. That’s an astounding 69%, and it happened before a college education was touted as the sure way to a make more money. The reason was largely the influence of a single teacher, or so said her students. Young, dedicated Jimmy Porter was determined to introduce them to a world beyond their tiny, rural hometown. Apparently, she succeeded. Making money was not her agenda. College grads often (though not always) begin at higher salaries and make more money over a lifetime, but unless we’ve turned into an entirely materialistic society, education isn’t meant to train people to get rich. Money is the sometimes-fallout, the unintended result of learning about the world. view article

Thanks to the Spring Branch Education Foundationmany area students will have a boost in paying for their advanced education next year. A record 149 Spring Branch Independent School District seniors received a total of $177,675 in scholarships at the SBEF 2017 Bright Stars of SBISD, Celebrating Academic Excellence awards program on May 18 at The Westin Houston, Memorial City. The event honored scholarship recipients as well as 2016-17 Teachers and Principals of the Year. view article

Lindale High School's UIL Academic Team made history history Tuesday as they took home first place at the state championship in Austin. This win marks the first championship since 2006 and their first ever as a 5A team. "They work so, so hard. The kids give up Saturdays and after school time," said UIL Coordinator Rory McKenzie. "I was actually a member of the state championship team back in 2004 and 2005, so it has been a lot of fun."  Three juniors we spoke with Wednesday have been competing on the speech and debate team since their freshman years. view article

Some Cypress Fairbanks Independent School District students will have the opportunity to graduate with a high school diploma and an associates of science degree. At a recent school board meeting, the administration provided the board with information on a pilot initiative in partnership with Lone Star College CyFair, the College Academy, which will provide 2017-18 freshman students at Cypress Lakes High School with an opportunity to graduate with a high school diploma and an associates of science degree. view article