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Abe Saavedra

Endorsement watch: Garza Lindner and Vilaseca

The Chron goes against an incumbent in HISD District I.

Janette Garza Lindner

Trustee Elizabeth Santos, 39, is asking voters to keep her on the board representing Houston ISD District I. They shouldn’t.

Santos’ connection to the district is deep. She grew up attending its schools and taught English there. Her dedication to students shines through when she speaks. As a board member, she helped get raises for teachers and staff as a vocal champion for better pay in the district, whose teachers remain among the region’s lowest paid.

That record speaks in her favor, but it does not overcome her weaknesses as a board member.

An early strike against Santos came in late 2018, when she joined four other trustees to oust Interim Superintendent Grenita Lathan in a surprise vote that came after the five had met with a former superintendent whom they then named to replace Lathan. The Texas Education Agency cited that apparent violation of the state’s open meetings law as partial grounds for replacing the whole board.

Santos defends her actions, and claimed in our meeting with her she hadn’t known in advance that Lathan would be fired. But the episode was deeply disruptive and showed poor judgment.

That was an early mistake, but unfortunately Santos has not provided the steady influence and smooth leadership that the school board, with all its recent acrimony, so badly needs. In interviews with us and other outlets recently, she has also struggled to share a cogent vision for how she’ll use a second term to steer the district to further success.

On the other hand, Janette Garza Lindner, 45, is a strong candidate. The mother of two HISD students, she grew up in Brownsville, bilingual in Spanish and English, as an adopted daughter of a widow who left school in the second grade and never learned to read. She graduated from the University of Texas and is an energy industry consultant and project manager. In 2019, she received training as a board fellow of Latinos for Education and serves on the leadership committee of Arts Connect Houston.

My interview with Elizabeth Santos is here, with Janette Garza Lindner is here, and with Matias Kopinsky is here. I noted the issue about the Lathan/Saavedra mess when the Chron endorsed Sue Deigaard, noting that she was not involved in the non-compliant meeting, but I totally forgot to mention that Santos was one of the trustees they might have opposed as a result. I don’t know how much this hurts Santos – she was not the Chron-endorsed candidate in 2017, either – but in a low-turnout affair it may boost Garza Lindner a bit. I figure this is going to a runoff anyway, so we’ll see then if Santos may be in some trouble.

Over in District VI, the Chron did endorse incumbent Holly Maria Flynn Vilaseca despite her involvement in that meeting.

Holly Flynn Vilaseca

Overseeing the nation’s seventh-largest public school system does not accommodate learning curves. After Holly Maria Flynn Vilaseca was appointed to the board in January 2017, the editorial board endorsed her for a full term , reasoning that nine months is hardly enough time to garner a first impression, let alone demonstrate the breadth of knowledge.

Through five years, three superintendents, an attempted state takeover of the district, Flynn Vilaseca has acquitted herself well on the board as a steady voice and an open mind with a deep fluency on education policy. We recommend District VI voters give her another term representing West Houston.

Flynn Vilaseca, 40, a bilingual former early childhood teacher, wants to bolster the district’s investments in special education and better train campus principals on managing finances to avoid wasteful spending. Her support for wraparound services for special education students is admirable and desperately needed in a district still routinely failing students with learning differences.

Flynn Vilaseca’s role in one of the more shameful chapters in the district’s history is a vulnerability. She was among five trustees who allegedly met in secret with former HISD superintendent Aberlardo Saavedra to coordinate replacing the interim superintendent with him. TEA officials alleged the “walking quorum” violated the Texas Open Meetings Act and led the agency to recommend replacing the entire board.

Flynn Vilaseca claims Saavedra was a long-time mentor and that she arranged the meeting so trustees could discuss “concerns on the board,” but never talked about hiring him. Why, then, did she hand Saavedra a copy of another former superintendent’s contract? According to her 2019 affidavit: “Because he had previously asked for it.”

Even if true, it doesn’t excuse how she was willing to vote days later, ostensibly with only a few minutes notice, without public input, to hire Saavedra.

That said, Flynn Vilaseca seemed sincere in her apology, and pledged to rebuild the public’s trust through transparency. We’re taking another chance on her because her collaborative, moderate voice is needed and because her challengers came up short.

My interview with Flynn Vilaseca is here and with Greg Degeyter is here. Maybe the difference in the Chron’s eyes between Santos and Flynn Vilaseca was the quality of the apology. We’ll see how Anne Sung fares when it’s her turn.

More on the Lathan non-hiring

Some sharp criticism from local leaders about the HISD Board’s decision not to hire interim Superintendent Grenita Lathan permanently.

About 20 of Houston’s leading Black elected officials, clergy and racial justice advocates called Tuesday for Houston ISD’s school board to reverse its vote last week declining to name Interim Superintendent Grenita Lathan as the district’s long-term leader.

In a statement and at a news conference, many of the city’s Black leaders argued Lathan has proven herself worthy of the top job since assuming the position on an interim basis in March 2018. Some officials also questioned whether trustees were motivated in part by race, given that the board’s three Black members supported retaining Lathan while the six non-Black members voted against it.

“For several reasons, we are united in our belief that the decision not to name Dr. Lathan as superintendent of HISD was grossly misguided, and I must add, ill-motivated,” NAACP Houston Branch Vice-President Bishop James Dixon said Tuesday, surrounded by about a dozen Lathan supporters outside the district’s headquarters.

The rebuke of trustees came five days after board members voted to resume the district’s long-dormant superintendent search and forgo removing Lathan’s interim tag. The board majority argued HISD should conduct a national search — with Lathan as a candidate, if she chooses to apply — before selecting a long-term leader.

“We owe it to our students to, at the very least, take a look at the records of other candidates and other superintendents who want to apply to the school district,” HISD Trustee Dani Hernandez said Thursday. “I cannot make this decision for my community and our students without conducting a search.”

The group that convened Tuesday included state Rep. Ron Reynolds, former HISD trustees Rhonda Skillern-Jones and Jolanda Jones and several religious leaders. In addition, U.S. Reps. Sheila Jackson Lee and Al Green, state Sen. Borris Miles, and state Reps. Alma Allen and Harold Dutton Jr. signed a statement in support of Lathan, according to the NAACP Houston Branch.

[…]

Board members were on the brink of naming a superintendent finalist in March 2019, but a state-appointed conservator ordered trustees to stand down. At the time, HISD remained under the threat of a state takeover of the district’s school board.

The Texas Education Agency ultimately moved in November 2019 to replace HISD’s elected trustees, citing a state law triggered by chronically low academic scores at Wheatley High School and multiple instances of trustee misconduct. HISD trustees sued to stop the takeover, and Travis County District Judge Catherine Mauzy issued a temporary injunction in January halting their ouster.

As part of the injunction, Mauzy ordered that the conservator is “prohibited from acting outside her lawful authority.” However, Mauzy did not state clearly whether that applied retroactively to the conservator’s order, leading to questions about whether trustees legally can conduct a superintendent search.

See here and here for the background. I don’t have a whole lot to add to what I’ve already said, but I will say this much: More discussion and engagement about this decision and the process that led to it would be a good idea. A full and honest accounting of the Saavedra situation from last year would help, too. I feel like there’s a lot we don’t know about what’s been happening, and that’s a problem.

HISD Board declines to hire Lathan permanently

A national search will be conducted, with still-interim Superintendent Grenita Lathan encouraged to apply.

Houston ISD trustees voted Thursday against committing to Interim Superintendent Grenita Lathan as the district’s long-term leader, opting instead to launch a national search before filling the position.

In a 6-3 vote, trustees generally complimented Lathan’s lengthy tenure as interim, but ultimately concluded the district needs a deeper search for a permanent chief. Some trustees encouraged Lathan to apply for the job during the search, though it is not immediately clear whether she will.

“As the largest school district in Texas and the seventh-largest in the United States, it is of the utmost importance that we think about candidates for the permanent superintendent position by going through a transparent and thorough search process,” HISD Trustee Holly Maria Flynn Vilaseca said.

“We owe it to our students, our community, our constituents and the taxpayers to do our due diligence.”

HISD trustees Judith Cruz, Sue Deigaard, Dani Hernandez, Elizabeth Santos and Anne Sung joined Flynn Vilaseca in voting to start the search. Lathan did not address the outcome during Thursday’s meeting or immediately respond to a request for comment through the district.

[…]

Lathan enjoyed strong backing from many other HISD administrators, with about 45 of them lauding her leadership amid district instability and the novel coronavirus pandemic.

“This period now has been, by far, one of the most difficult I have seen during my tenure,” said Moreno Elementary School Principal Adriana Abarca-Castro, who has led the campus for 31 years. “I have witnessed how our superintendent, Dr. Lathan, has led us courageously, positively and (been) supportive in every way.”

Many of the city’s Black civic leaders also rallied to support Lathan, with U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee and state Reps. Alma Allen and Senfronia Thompson endorsing her Thursday. Lathan would have become the district’s first Black woman to lead the district if chosen.

However, Lathan’s tenure coincided with scathing state reports documenting extensive operational and special education issues in the district. One of HISD’s longest-struggling campuses, Wheatley High School, also received its seventh straight failing grade in 2019, triggering a state law that resulted in Education Commissioner Mike Morath moving to replace the district’s elected school board.

Some trustees argued HISD should not lock in a superintendent while they continue to fight in court to stop their ouster. The board’s lawsuit against the state is pending before the Texas Supreme Court.

“The TEA lawsuit has huge implications for our choice,” HISD Trustee Elizabeth Santos said.

HISD trustees did not outline a plan Thursday for conducting their search, though questions remain about whether they can legally engage in the process.

See here for the background. This whole thing is a mess. The best argument for doing the national search is that this is the way we have always searched for Superintendents. Under normal circumstances, the HISD Super job is a plum – we’re a big district, we’re in good fiscal shape, we’ve got a lot of good schools, and yet there are some real challenges on which someone with vision can make a difference. We get good applicants, and just the process of reviewing and interviewing them can provide some new perspective on HISD and its mission.

Of course, these are not normal circumstances. Putting aside the current disfunction with the Board, the looming state takeover would be a pretty serious drawback for any potential applicant, and that’s before you take into account the fact that the eventual appointed board of managers might move to vacate your contract. Plus, the fact that you’d be competing against a now-multi-year interim Super for the job might be an impediment. I don’t even know how to factor in the whole Abe Saavedra fiasco, other than as another example of what a circus it has been around here. The clear downside risk of not making Grenita Lathan permanent, even on a shorter-than-usual contract, is that she might just decide that she’s had it with this bullshit and leave, and now we don’t have any Superintendent at a time when that would be really bad. I don’t feel strongly one way or the other about Lathan, but it is fair to say she has not been treated well by the Board, even with two of the instigators of the Saavedra mess being defeated in the 2019 election. I don’t know where we go from here.

HISD to consider hiring Lathan permanently

Interesting.

Houston ISD trustees are scheduled to vote Thursday on whether to name Interim Superintendent Grenita Lathan as the lone finalist to lead the district, an unanticipated development amid ongoing litigation over the state’s effort to oust HISD’s elected board members.

If trustees do not agree to remove Lathan’s interim tag, they also could vote Thursday to resume their search for a permanent superintendent, which has been essentially dormant for more than a year and a half.

It is not immediately clear whether HISD trustees can legally hire a superintendent or resume their search. A state-appointed conservator overseeing the district ordered trustees to halt their search in March 2019, but a Travis County judge issued a temporary injunction in HISD’s favor in January. The judge ruled the conservator is “prohibited from acting outside her lawful authority,” but did not clearly state whether that applied retroactively to the search suspension order.

[…]

The move to address the superintendent position arose Monday, when HISD Board President Sue Deigaard placed the two items on Thursday’s meeting agenda. Deigaard said she approved the agenda items at the request of some fellow trustees, whom she declined to name.

“We’re long overdue for this conversation, and at the request of my colleagues, we will now have this conversation,” Deigaard said. “I’m trying to approach it in a way that is respectful of the diverse opinions of my board colleagues, as well as trying to be considerate as possible.”

While most districts replace their superintendents in a matter of months with little public acrimony — Clear Creek ISD announced a lone finalist Monday — HISD’s search has faced chaos at each turn.

Most infamously, five of the board’s nine members covertly coordinated to oust Lathan in October 2018, giving no advance notice ahead of a vote to replace her with former HISD superintendent Abelardo Saavedra. Many of the city’s Black leaders denounced the replacement of Lathan, while others decried the lack of transparency. Trustees ultimately reversed their decision the next week, restoring Lathan’s interim tag.

Board members subsequently launched a national superintendent search, nearing the selection of a lone finalist. However, state conservator Doris Delaney, in place due to chronically low performance at several schools, employed her legal power to halt the search. Delaney provided little reason for the move in her order.

Texas Education Commissioner Mike Morath then announced in November 2019 his intention to replace HISD’s elected trustees , citing multiple instances of misconduct among board members and a state law mandating sanctions after Wheatley High School received its seventh consecutive failing grade.

HISD sought and received an injunction, but questions remained about the lack of clarity in the order. From then on, trustees never spoke at length about resuming the search or permanently hiring Lathan until Monday. The legal case is pending before the Texas Supreme Court on a procedural matter.

There’s more, so read the rest. Apparently, any three Board members can put an item on the agenda. I have no strong opinion on this – in an ideal world, we would have had a national search by now, and it Lathan had been the choice, then so be it. As it is, who knows what might happen, given the state of the situation with the TEA. Chron reporter Jacob Carpenter gives an explainer on Twitter, and also notes that Lathan wants the job. We’ll find out tomorrow.

Initial reaction to the TEA action on HISD

Lots of wait and see so far.

Houston-area political and community leaders offered muted response Thursday to a state recommendation issued this week to replace Houston ISD’s school board, reserving judgment until more details are known about a Texas Education Agency investigation into allegations of misconduct by multiple trustees.

One day after the state’s recommendation became public via media reports, area officials grappled with questions about the investigation while reinforcing their beliefs about the appropriateness of dramatic intervention in Texas’ largest school district. The recommendation is contained in a Texas Education Agency investigative report that circulated only among HISD officials and state lawmakers until Thursday evening, when the full document became public through a federal court filing.

The report documents multiple instances of alleged wrongdoing by trustees, varying in severity. The most serious findings include five trustees violating the Texas Open Meetings Act, multiple board members interfering in district operations and Board President Diana Dávila conspiring to steer a custodial contract to a preferred vendor. HISD officials have until Aug. 15 to formally respond to the allegations, after which Texas Education Commissioner Mike Morath will decide whether to implement the recommendation made by his staff.

“In order to make an informed opinion, I need to really sink my teeth in the report,” said state Sen. Carol Alvarado, D-Houston. “I will do that over the next couple days and look to see what HISD’s response is.”

HISD trustees and community members offered few comments about the investigation Thursday during a regularly-scheduled meeting, which passed with only fleeting references to the report. Dávila, who has denied the multiple allegations levied against her in the state’s report, issued a call for retaining local control over the school district.

“The citizens of Houston should not be punished by taking away their democratic right to be able to elect, or un-elect, those that they feel do not support what’s in the best interest of students,” Dávila said.

Several other trustees have declined to comment on the report or not responded to requests for comment. As she left Thursday’s meeting, HISD Trustee Elizabeth Santos said she is “waiting for due process” before commenting on allegations that she violated open meetings laws.

See here for the background. The report is here, published via the Chron, and since I haven’t read it yet I’ll not have anything further to say just yet. I will note I haven’t seen much posting about it on Facebook, though I can’t say I’ve been comprehensive. Maybe HISD will have a good response to it, I don’t know. For now, I’d say a lot of people are processing. Campos and the Press have more.

It looks like we’re getting a new school board

What a mess.

Texas Education Agency officials have recommended that a state-appointed governing team replace Houston ISD’s locally elected school board after a six-month investigation found several instances of alleged misconduct by some trustees, including violations of the Texas Open Meetings Act, inappropriate influencing of vendor contracts and making false statements to investigators.

The recommendation and findings, issued by TEA Special Investigations Unit Director Jason Hewitt, will not become final until HISD officials have had an opportunity to respond. Texas Education Commissioner Mike Morath, who leads the agency, ultimately will decide whether to oust HISD’s school board. HISD officials have until Aug. 15 to respond, and Morath likely would issue a final decision in the following weeks.

In his recommendation, Hewitt wrote that HISD trustees should be replaced by a state-appointed board due to their “demonstrated inability to appropriately govern, inability to operate within the scope of their authority, circumventing the authority of the superintendent, and inability to ensure proper contract procurement laws are followed.”

[…]

In their report, state investigators outline multiple years of failed oversight and improper behavior by HISD’s much-maligned school board, which long has grappled with in-fighting and distrust. Conflict within the board reached a boiling point in the summer and fall of 2018 when trustees clashed over whether to retain Lathan, who took over as interim superintendent following Richard Carranza’s abrupt departure to become chancellor of New York City public schools.

Five board members had grown particularly frustrated with Lathan, believing she had not been responsive to their desires for the district and failed to adequately protect them from a threat posed by a community activist.

Through interviews and a review of text messages, state investigators determined the five trustees — Board President Diana Dávila, Holly Maria Flynn Vilaseca, Sergio Lira, Elizabeth Santos and Anne Sung — secretly met with former HISD superintendent Abelardo Saavedra in two separate groups to coordinate ousting Lathan and installing him as interim superintendent. The meetings took place at a Houston restaurant on the same day in October 2018, the report said. Investigators determined that arrangement constituted a “walking quorum,” in violation of state law that requires trustees to conduct district business in public.

Three days later, the five trustees voted to replace Lathan with Saavedra, offering no advance warning to the public or the other four board members about the move. Trustees reinstated Lathan within a week of the vote following intense public backlash. Lathan remains the district’s indefinite leader.

TEA officials interviewed trustees as part of their investigation, ultimately determining that Dávila and Lira falsely claimed in interviews with investigators that they only met one-on-one with Saavedra. In separate interviews, Saavedra and Flynn Vilaseca placed Dávila and Lira at the restaurant meetings, the report states.

In an interview Wednesday, Dávila said she provided her best recollection of meeting Saavedra to TEA investigators, and denied that she attempted to mislead state officials.

“They wanted us to remember things that happened six, seven months prior to us being interviewed,” Dávila said.

So in the end it will be the ethics investigation that brings down the Board. We’ll get the performance results for the schools, including the four that needed to meet standards this year, on August 15, so there may be another cause for the demise, but this one came first. This isn’t final yet – the Board has until the 15th to respond to this report, and then TEA Commissioner Mike Morath gets to make his ruling – but the handwriting on the wall is quite clear. The state is stepping in to take over the HISD Board.

The report isn’t public yet – I presume it will be by the time Morath issues his ruling – but the Chron got to see it. The other misconduct allegations reported in the story apply to Diana Davila, with Sergio Lira also being accused of not being truthful to investigators. I feel like in other circumstances, with a Board that wasn’t already under a conservator, this would be an embarrassment but not the end of the existing Board. In such other circumstances, I might be moved to outrage at the prospect of our democratically elected Board being summarily replaced, even if only for a couple of years, by state-selected trustees. I find it hard to muster any such reaction this time. I find myself resignedly in agreement with this:

Trustee Jolanda Jones, who frequently has criticized colleagues who voted to oust Lathan, said replacement of the school board is “sadly, unfortunately” in the district’s best interests.

“I think it’s tragic, but I think the alternative is worse,” Jones said.

The good news, such as it is, is that the four schools in question, which have been making progress, will probably not be closed. That was a huge point of contention with the parent groups. If that’s truly off the table, then my guess is that reaction to this will be somewhat more muted. Who is going to step up to defend the current board, and demand that the TEA leave them in place?

It should be noted that there will still be elections for HISD trustees this November. These elected trustees, along with the others that are not on the November ballot, will still serve but have much less power in the interim. At least two of the four trustees whose terms are up this year (Rhonda Skillern-Jones, who is running for HCC Board, and Jolanda Jones) have announced they are not running for re-election, with Davila being rumored to not run again as well. If the end result of all this is that in another two or four years we get to elect nine new members, and (hopefully) the sword of Damocles that is the academic standards issue is not looming over us when we do (good luck with that, whoever the TEA picks to run the place), I find it hard to be too upset about that. I’m certainly not more upset than I am about everything that led to this.

Superintendent search will continue

For the time being, at least.

Houston ISD’s pursuit of a permanent superintendent will continue after trustees rejected a motion Thursday to suspend the search amid a recently launched state investigation into potential violations of open meetings laws.

Trustees voted 5-3 to continue the search for a permanent leader to replace former superintendent Richard Carranza, who left the district in March 2018 to become chancellor of New York City public schools. Three trustees who favored suspending the effort argued the district cannot attract qualified candidates with the looming threat of sanctions tied to the state investigation, while the five opponents argued the district should push forward despite the inquiry.

“I promised my community that I would do a superintendent search, and that’s what I’m following.” said HISD Board President Diana Dávila, who voted against suspending the search.

[…]

The three trustees who supported suspending the search — Wanda Adams, Jolanda Jones and Rhonda Skillern-Jones — have all advocated for permanently retaining Interim Superintendent Grenita Lathan, arguing she has proven her ability to lead the district.

The trio of trustees have been highly critical of five board members who secretly communicated with former HISD superintendent Abelardo Saavedra, then voted in October 2018 to replace Lathan with Saavedra. Allegations of open meetings act violations by the five trustees who spoke to Saavedra triggered a special accreditation agency investigation by the Texas Education Agency. The five trustees have denied wrongdoing.

Supporters of suspending the search argued the potential for severe sanctions tied to the investigation will limit the pool of candidates willing to jump to HISD. If state officials order the replacement of the HISD board, new trustees could immediately replace the freshly hired superintendent.

“I cannot imagine that a highly qualified candidate who is rational and sane would come here in the face of uncertainty, when they may not have a job soon,” Skillern-Jones said.

The five trustees who voted against the motion Thursday — Dávila, Holly Maria Flynn Vilaseca, Sergio Lira, Elizabeth Santos and Anne Sung — have pushed for a nationwide search. Trustee Sue Deigaard, who previously supported giving Lathan a short-term contract and simultaneously conducting a nationwide search, abstained from Thursday’s vote, telling her colleagues she is “not going to be part of this divide anymore.”

“We all need to figure this out and not continue to be divisive on this subject,” Deigaard said.

I mean, as a matter of principle it’s generally a good idea to search far and wide for the best candidate. Under normal circumstances, the HISD job is pretty plum – it’s a big district with a good financial foundation and a lot of high-performing schools, and more than one former Superintendent has gone on to bigger things. For obvious reasons, the job isn’t quite as attractive right now – the search firm says the potential of a TEA takeover has been mentioned by numerous candidates. There’s a good case to be made for Trustee Deigaard’s position of extending Superintendent Lathan for now, and resuming the search later, say in a year or so, when the immediate issues have been clarified, if not resolved. One can also reasonably argue that with so much on the line right now, it’s wiser to leave the Superintendent in place who has been doing the work to get the four schools that need to meet standards up to those standards. By all accounts, the current program for bringing the schools in need up to standard has been working well. I don’t know enough to say that I’d support making Superintendent Lathan permanent at this time, but I’d definitely support keeping her in place for the near term and revisiting the question at a later date. As I’ve said before about all things HISD, I sure hope this works out. The Press has more.

HISD back under scrutiny

Let’s hope this turns out to be no big deal.

The Texas Education Agency is investigating possible open meetings violations by some Houston ISD trustees last year when they engaged in private discussions that led to the abrupt ouster of the Interim Superintendent Grenita Lathan.

TEA officials notified the district Tuesday that an investigation would begin following “multiple complaints” made to the agency over the vote to replace Lathan with former district superintendent Abelardo Saavedra, according to a letter sent to Lathan and HISD board President Diana Dávila. The Houston Chronicle reviewed a portion of the letter outlining the allegations.

“Houston ISD Board of Trustees may have violated The Open Meetings Act by deliberating district business prior to a regularly scheduled board meeting regarding the potential removal of the current interim superintendent and the installation of a new interim superintendent,” the notice read.

TEA officials confirmed they opened a special accreditation investigation into HISD, though they declined to specify the nature of the inquiry.

A special accreditation investigation gives TEA officials wide discretion to review potential wrongdoing and issue a range of sanctions. If investigators find repeated or extensive misconduct, the most severe punishment could be a state takeover of the district’s locally elected board. However, state leaders could issue nominal punishment aimed at preventing future missteps by trustees.

[…]

The investigation stems from an October 2018 vote by five trustees — Dávila, Holly Maria Flynn Vilaseca, Elizabeth Santos, Sergio Lira and Anne Sung — to replace Lathan.

The vote came with no advance warning to the public, and the board’s four other members have said they were unaware that colleagues planned to seek Lathan’s ouster.

Saavedra backed out of the job three days after the vote, citing “dysfunction” at the school board level. Trustees then voted to reinstate Lathan.

Saavedra told the Chronicle in October that he spoke independently with the five trustees who voted for his appointment prior to the vote. Some of the five trustees have said they communicated one-on-one, but they did not meet as a group.

Under Texas open meetings law, deliberations between school board members about “public business or public policy” subject to a vote must take place at public meetings. State investigators likely will seek any evidence of communications between trustees that could constitute a so-called “walking quorum,” which refers to a deliberative effort by elected officials to communicate as a group in private.

See here, here, and here for more on the Saavedra saga, which didn’t make much sense then and makes even less now. All I can say is that I hope the TEA finds no evidence of the five Trustees forming a non-sanctioned quorum, which would be dumb at the least and a violation of trust at the worst. The TEA already has the power to take over HISD if they feel the need. I sure hope we haven’t given them another reason to consider it.

Trustees apologize for Saavedra/Lathan mess

It’s a start.

Houston ISD trustees on Monday offered a public apology to students, parents and teachers for their behavior the past 10 months, particularly the chaotic meeting last week when a faction of the board surprised their colleagues and the audience by replacing the interim superintendent.

Trustees said they hoped the apology and pledge to work better with each other is the first step toward quelling infighting on the board, restoring the public’s trust and showing the Texas Education Agency that HISD is capable of governing itself.

“Our actions have not modeled the behavior we desire to instill in our children that we serve,” said Trustee Diana Dávila at a lectern surrounded by her eight colleagues. “We sincerely apologize to all of you.”

[…]

Trustee Jolanda Jones said the board at a special meeting Thursday morning would set an end date for its search for a permanent superintendent, consider hiring an executive coach for the school board and Lathan, and request a new governance counselor from the Texas Education Agency, which has been monitoring the board for months.

The trustees then left the boardroom, refusing to answer questions about what convinced trustees to change course, whether they had broken the law in secretly recruiting Saavedra and why the public should trust this latest pledge to do better.

[…]

Despite her contrition, questions remain about whether Dávila and four colleagues violated the Texas Open Meetings Act by approaching Saavedra about taking over as superintendent before informing the rest of the board or the public.

Saavedra, who served as HISD’s superintendent from 2005 to 2009, told the Chronicle on Sunday that he spoke separately with five trustees — including the four Latino members — in the days before the vote to appoint him.

Of the five trustees who voted for his appointment, Davila, Sergio Lira and Holly Maria Flynn Vilaseca said they met with Saavedra beforehand. The other two “yes” votes, Elizabeth Santos and Anne Sung, did not respond to repeated requests for comment.

Joe Larsen, a Houston First Amendment lawyer and expert on Texas’ open meetings and public information laws, said Saavedra’s acknowledgment that he spoke with a majority of trustees privately is evidence that they may have broken the law.

“It certainly would appear to indicate there’s some coordination between those five individuals toward a specific goal, constituting a majority,” Larsen said. “That’s precisely the sort of thing that should have been deliberated in public.”

The district attorney’s office would need to investigate any possible violation of the Open Meetings Act, Larsen said, which is a misdemeanor. A spokesman for Harris County District Attorney Kim Ogg said the office does not comment on investigations that may or may not exist.

See here and here for the background. It’s good to hear the Board speak in this fashion, and to apparently recognize the lack of trust they have earned with the public, but suffice it to say that their actions will speak far louder than any words of contrition. I say this as someone who knows nearly all of them – I’ve never met Diana Davila, and I have only spoken to Sergio Lira over the phone – and who likes and respects them. For a broad range of reasons, I really really want them to work together to solve problems and make HISD the best it can be. This is a start, but there’s a very long way to go, and that’s before we consider the possibility that the Open Meetings Act was violated. One step at a time. The Press has more.

Saavedra out

Whiplash.

Trustees are expected to announce Monday that interim superintendent Grenita Lathan will remain at the helm of the Houston Independent School District, an attempt to diffuse fallout from a contentious 5-4 vote last Thursday that was preceded by shouting matches and accusations of racism from board members.

After a six-hour discussion during a weekend retreat Sunday, trustees and Abelardo Saavedra – who led HISD from 2004 to 2009 and was to return Monday as the district’s new interim leader – mutually agreed that he would withdraw, Saavedra said.

“It became apparent to me that the dysfunction is not at the superintendent or leadership level, it’s at the board level,” Saavedra said, adding that he was unaware the move to hire him was going to catch some board members by surprise.

Lathan is expected to return as the interim leader of the nation’s seventh-largest school district while a search continues for a permanent superintendent. District officials said late Sunday that trustees would “discuss the recent vote to make changes to the interim superintendent’s position” at a 5 p.m. Monday press conference, but offered no further details.

[…]

Bob Sanborn, CEO of the nonprofit Children at Risk, said he believes Lathan remaining in her role is good for students, but he said the damage that has been done cannot be reversed by the trustees simply standing together at a press conference.

“Nothing has really been diffused. You still have this divide on the board – racial, political or otherwise, it’s a clear divide – and they’re going to have to work through it if they want a good superintendent, whether it’s an African-American or Latino or any other turnaround leader,” Sanborn said. “They’re going to have to put aside some of these differences and make it work or our school children will be the ones to bear the brunt of their dysfunction.”

See here for the background. If you’re feeling dizzy, you’re not alone. I have no idea what is going on with the Board, but good Lord they need to get it together and work as a unit rather than as factions. None of this should have happened.

Saavedra 2.0

This was unexpected.

In a raucous school board meeting filled with shouting and accusations lobbed by trustees against each other, the Houston Independent School District’s board of trustees late Thursday replaced interim Superintendent Grenita Lathan with former HISD Superintendent Abelardo Saavedra.

The vote, which followed a motion that several board members said came as a surprise to them, returns Lathan to her previous role as chief academic officer.

The vote marks the third leader this calendar year for the 214,000-student school district.

The unexpected discussion came as trustees were about to decide whether to extend Lathan’s contract through Sept. 30, 2019.

[…]

Before trustees voted on Lathan’s contract, trustee Diana Davila proposed a motion to dismiss Lathan as the district’s temporary leader and insert Saavedra.

That motion drew passionate criticism from trustee Wanda Adams, who said there was a racial divide on the board between African-American and Latino trustees. She said the proposal should have been discussed in closed session rather than sprung on the dais.

“This is disrespectful,” Adams said. “I did not know about this at all. Some of my other colleagues did not know about it. Some knew about it — (Sergio) Lira knew about it, Holly (Flynn Vilaseca) knew about it and (Elizabeth) Santos knew about it. It goes back to my original statement about racism on this board.”

In a discussion about this on Monica Flores Richart’s Facebook page, it was suggested that having an interim Superintendent who does not want the job on a permanent basis is better for conducting a national service than having an interim Super who is a candidate for that job. Saavedra (apparently) does not want the job long term, while Lathan does, and has the backing for that of at least the three African-American members of the Board. I think this is a plausible argument, but I agree with Trustee Adams that it’s the sort of discussion that should have been had with the whole Board before making any decisions (much less a motion). For sure, having this kind of public fight won’t do anything to attract decent candidates, and that’s before we take into account the continuing specter of a state takeover. I understand Saavedra has a good record dealing with a district that faced similar problems in recent years, but one wonders how much clout a known short-time boss will have, especially given the recent exodus of senior leaders within HISD. I wish Saavedra all the success in the world in his temporary gig, because we’re sure gonna need it. The Press has more.

“Denied”: HISD and special education

There are problems here as well.

Superintendent Richard Carranza announced Thursday that the Houston Independent School District has decided to conduct a detailed review of the way that it serves students with disabilities.

The effort will include asking “independent, third-party experts to conduct a deep-dive analysis of our special education operation,” Carranza said.

The newly-hired superintendent announced the review in a statement, saying it would be the district’s “first order of business when the new year begins.”

“We will have a tough conversation about the importance of serving all children, regardless of any disability,” Carranza wrote. “Together, we will find solutions that serve our children because that is what Houston expects, and that is what Houston’s children deserve.”

The announcement came one day after the Houston Chronicle published a story detailing how Houston ISD has deliberately denied special education services to thousands of students with disabilities over the past decade.

Here’s that earlier story. It’s pretty damning.

Houston schools provide special education services to a lower percentage of students than schools in virtually any other big city in America. Only Dallas serves fewer than Houston’s 7.26 percent. The national average is 13 percent.

For months, as special education has come under increasing scrutiny in Texas, Houston Independent School District officials have described their percentage as a good thing, saying it is the product of robust early interventions that have helped students without labeling them.

But a Houston Chronicle investigation has found that HISD achieved its low special education rate by deliberately discouraging and delaying evaluations in pursuit of goals that have clearly denied critical services to thousands of children with disabilities.

Records show the largest school district in Texas enthusiastically embraced a controversial state policy that has driven special education enrollments to the lowest in the United States. In fact, after HISD officials reduced their enrollment rate from 10 percent to the Texas Education Agency’s 8.5 percent target, they set an even more restrictive standard: 8 percent.

To accomplish the objective, HISD officials slashed hundreds of positions from the special education department, dissuaded evaluators from diagnosing disabilities until second grade and created a list of “exclusionary factors” that disqualify students from getting services, among other tactics described in district documents, court records and dozens of interviews.

Read the whole thing. This is a travesty, and it needs to be fixed. Whatever it takes, this needs to be fixed.

HISD set to hire Grier

But not without some drama first.

The Houston school board is expected to officially hire Terry Grier as superintendent Thursday and offer him a multiyear contract that is likely to top $400,000 a year in salary and perks over time.

Three weeks of intense negotiations on the deal dragged into Wednesday evening, with trustees trying to ensure they didn’t end up repeating the costly deal they had with Superintendent Abelardo Saavedra, who stepped down last month.

Saavedra’s exit package cost taxpayers $978,967, according to the district. Much of the payout was for unused time off he had accrued over his career, plus extra vacation days the board granted him.

HISD Trustee Paula Harris said Saavedra’s contract served as a “lesson learned,” and this time around the board paid “a lot more attention to detail.”

“It’s a fair contract,” Harris said. “Both sides should be quite pleased.”

Harris said she expects the board to unanimously appoint Grier at its 5 p.m. meeting today — though state Sen. Mario Gallegos is threatening to derail the process.

Gallegos, D-Houston, said he is prepared to ask Harris County District Attorney Pat Lykos’ office to investigate the school board for possible violations of the state’s open-meetings law.

He said he believes trustees unlawfully deliberated about Grier’s contract before naming him the lone finalist for superintendent last month, and he has requested documents from the district to try to prove his case.

“I’m serious about this,” said Gallegos, who sent a letter with his demands Tuesday to HISD’s outside counsel, Chris Gilbert. “I believe the public was shut out.”

I doubt Sen. Gallegos will get any joy out of this, but as one who’s on record opposing the secret superintendent search, I am interested in seeing what he finds out. I do think the Board should have been more open, and if they say that makes their job of finding superintendents too hard, then it’s on them to lobby the Lege to write a new law that explicitly allows them to do it their way. I hope in the end that Dr. Grier will be such a success that all of this will some day be looked back on as a mere trifle, but in the meantime we ought to know if all the rules were followed in hiring him.

Saavedra’s exit interview

Now-former HISD Superintendent Abe Saavedra grades his performance. His answers are sadly too short to most of the questions. I’d really have liked to have heard more on this:

Q: If you could wave a magic wand and unilaterally change any HISD policy without school board approval, what would it be?

A: It would center around the issue of governance. I would reorganize the school board to where five of the seats would be single-member districts and four would be at-large. I don’t believe single-member districts are good for the system.

Why do you think single-member districts are bad for the system? I’m not really sure I could say. Anyone want to speculate?

Terry and Abe

Here’s another get-to-know-Terry Grier story, focusing on his time in San Diego. The most interesting bit to me is right here:

Abelardo Saavedra, the man Grier is in line to replace in Houston, endured more than his share of criticism for making big decisions without public input during nearly five years on the job. And many of Saavedra’s biggest proposals — courting outside groups to take over troubled high schools and scaling back busing for HISD’s popular magnet school program, for instance — failed after meeting swift and powerful opposition. His $805 million bond referendum in 2007 almost died because of intense lobbying from some of Houston’s most powerful black politicians and activists, who felt left out of the process.

But HISD school trustee Paula Harris, who was part of the unanimous vote to name Grier as the sole superintendent finalist, said Grier has the political skill to succeed where the less charismatic Saavedra stumbled.

While the two men may have some similarities, Harris said, “Terry’s going to be able to sell his ideas better.”

I can believe that Grier will be a better politician than Saavedra, and that he will have less trouble selling some of his ideas as a result. But part of Saavedra’s problem wasn’t so much the sales job as it was the lack of public input before the sales pitch. If Grier repeats that pattern he’ll have trouble no matter how good his political skills are. Get people on board beforehand, especially when making changes, and the rest follows a lot more easily. We’ll see how good he is at that.

No vote from HISD on several school upgrades

Last week, I noted that a parents group and some HISD trustees were complaining about there not being a vote on three school construction projects that were promised as part of the 2007 bond referendum. Even though we now have a new Superintendent in tow, which was supposedly the holdup on these items, they’re still not getting any action.

Parents trying to get facilities upgrades at several Houston ISD campuses said Monday that Board President Larry Marshall has once again thwarted efforts to bring the matter to a vote this week.

Saying she is in a “complete state of shock” after the posting of the board’s workshop schedule for Thursday morning, which contains only three of seven schools, education activist Mary Nesbitt is calling on parents and others to come to the workshop to get the board to honor commitments by Supterintendent Abe Saavedra to correct facilities deficits at Bellaire High School, Grady Middle School, Sam Houston High and the High School for the Performing and Visual Arts.

Nesbitt called Marshall’s actions “completely unprecedented and without regard for the wishes of the other board members who made a formal request to put forward the package of seven schools.”

Nesbit sent out another message to the Facebook group HISD Parent Visionaries about this, which I’ve reproduced beneath the fold. Trustee Harvin Moore said on Twitter that this was “The most bizarre power play I have witnessed in six years on the HISD board”. The workshop will be held at 7:30 a.m. Thursday in the Board Services Conference Room at district headquarters, 4400 W. 18th St., and I daresay it will be contentious. Be there if you can.

(more…)

Meet the new HISD boss

Here’s more on Terry Grier, the new HISD Superintendent-to-be.

Grier, 59, has been at the helm of the 135,000-student San Diego Unified School District since March 2008. He’s won support for his efforts to boost student achievement and curb dropouts, but his relationship with the teachers’ union and the labor-friendly school board has been rocky.

“Throughout his career Dr. Grier has built a strong reputation for innovation and school reform,” HISD school board President Larry Marshall said in a written statement. “The entire board was impressed with his innovative approach and passion to reform schools and improve student achievement.”

In Houston, Grier will face a larger district with a stubborn dropout problem and a board friendlier to some of his reform ideas, such as performance pay for teachers. The board’s announcement today marks the end of an intense five-month search cloaked in secrecy. The search, which cost taxpayers more than $100,000, intensified in recent weeks with the board interviewing about a dozen people behind closed doors.

[…]

Grier has the misfortune of being hired by a board in San Diego that underwent significant turnover after he signed his contract.

“It’s a different board than the board that hired him,” said San Diego board President Shelia Jackson. “I think he’s used to a board that kind of accepts what he says as gospel, and that’s not particularly true of this board.”

Grier could be walking into a similar situation in Houston, where five of nine school board positions will be on the November ballot. Some of those seats will be occupied by newcomers who won’t have been involved in Grier’s selection. Two incumbents — Natasha Kamrani and Dianne Johnson — have already announced they won’t seek re-election.

Grier’s supporters in San Diego acknowledge his rift with the board and the union, but they praise his leadership and focus on student achievement. Test scores released this week for San Diego rose to an all-time high, although it’s difficult to say how much of that is a result of Grier’s efforts during his short tenure, which covers just one full academic year.

[…]

Camille Zombro, president of the teachers’ union, the San Diego Education Association, said Grier has a “short-attention-span reform style.”

“I’m really sad for Houston,” Zombro said. “It’s not about the particular initiatives or programs he’s put into place or supported. It’s about who he is and his ineffectiveness as a manager.”

One of Grier’s more divisive ideas in San Diego mirrors an ongoing debate in Houston: whether to include student test score data in teachers’ evaluations.

Gayle Fallon, the Houston Federation of Teachers president, reserved judgment.

“I don’t know the man, and we give every superintendent a chance to establish his own relationship with us,” she said. “It’s up to a superintendent to determine whether they want a positive relationship or whether they want to fight.”

Like Gayle Fallon, I’ll reserve judgment for now. I think it’s a good move to hire someone who has had success in lowering dropout rates. If he can do that here, he’ll be a success pretty much no matter what. Hair Balls, School Zone, and Marc Campos have more.

Parents call on HISD to keep promises Saavedra made

With the revelation that HISD may have chosen its new superintendent, this Chron story from yesterday about how parent groups who were promised certain specific actions from outgoing Superintendent Abe Saavedra relating to the bond referendum, and the Board of Trustees’ apparent reluctance to act on them until they have a new super in place, may now be moot. But it’s still an interesting look at how the Board can operate, and why folks feel frustration about them.

Board President Larry Marshall denied a request by Trustees Manuel Rodriguez Jr., Harvin Moore and Dianne Johnson — who wanted the board to move forward with several construction projects at a meeting this Thursday.

Saavedra’s administration was prepared to recommend $56 million in upgrades to Lockhart Elementary School, Bellfort Academy, Grady Middle School, and Bellaire, Sam Houston and Worthing high schools. Saavedra, who declined to comment on the proposal, also was seeking a $40 million new High School for the Performing and Visual Arts, pending private sector help in finding a downtown location.

Marshall said he would not consider the trustees’ request until after the board selects a new superintendent — which could happen as soon as Thursday.

“It is most inappropriate to allow such distractions to interfere with the search process,” Marshall wrote in a letter to his fellow trustees.

Some parents have questioned Marshall’s response, [Mary Nesbitt, vice president of Parents for Public Schools] said, because he is allowing trustees to a discuss another divisive topic Thursday: paying higher wages to construction workers. Saavedra promised to push for higher wages during the 2007 bond campaign in exchange for support from labor unions.

It would seem that distraction is no longer present. We’ll see how the Board reacts to it. A message from Nesbitt to a Facebook group called HISD Visionaries regarding this is reproduced below.

(more…)

Has HISD chosen its new superintendent?

The Chron says Yes.

The man in charge of the San Diego, Calif. public schools has emerged as the frontrunner to take over the Houston Independent School District, the Houston Chronicle has learned.

Terry Grier, superintendent of the San Diego Unified School District, could be named the sole finalist for the HISD job as soon as Thursday. HISD gave notice this afternoon that a vote on a new superintendent is likely to happen Thursday or Monday. (Here is Grier’s biography in San Diego.)

Grier has been on the job in San Diego since March 2008. He ran the Guilford County School District in Greensboro, N.C. for about eight years before leaving for California.

A former teacher and principal, Grier has overseen eight school districts in 25 years and has a reputation as a fast-charging leader. In San Diego, he has had a rocky relationship with the teachers’ union and the school board. Less than a year after Grier was hired, a school board election changed the make-up of the board and it became more supportive of labor.

“It’s a different board than the board that hired him,” said Shelia Jackson, the president of the San Diego school board. “The board that we have now is a board that’s very progressive so we tend to ask questions. I think he’s used to a board that kind of accepts what he says as gospel, and that’s not particularly true of this board.”

Hair Balls did a little googling and found that Grier’s tenure in Greenville was somewhat contentious. I’m wondering what the reaction will be to a superintendent that’s not a minority in a school district that’s overwhelmingly non-Anglo. I look forward to seeing what folks have to say about Grier, if he is indeed the chosen one.

UPDATE: As Greg notes, Grier is on Twitter.

Eight candidates for HISD Superintendent

We don’t know who the candidates are for HISD Superintendent, but at least we know how many of them there are. There’s a Heisenberg joke in there somewhere, I’m just not certain how to find it.

The Houston school board president said Thursday that trustees could possibly hire a new superintendent in the new few weeks.

The board interviewed three candidates for the job Thursday, bringing the total number to eight.

Superintendent Abelardo Saavedra plans to step down Aug. 31.

“Our goal would be to have someone in place on or before Aug. 31,” school board President Larry Marshall said.

Asked if that was likely, he said, “It seems achievable.”

The board plans to conduct more closed-door interviews next week, perhaps as early as Monday, said Les Csorba, one of the board’s search consultants. Csorba and Marshall would not say whether the upcoming interviews will be with new candidates or follow-ups with ones interviewed already.

“I can’t tell you whether it’s round two, three, four, five or six,” Marshall said. “We’re still in the ring.”

Csorba, a partner with Heidrick & Struggles, said the search still is open for last-minute applicants who wanted to lead the Houston Independent School District.

“It’s starting to get late,” he said. “The window’s closing.”

Well, whoever it is will have to deal with this.

Nearly 90 percent of Houston ISD schools meet federal accountability standards, state officials announced today, but the school district itself faces possible sanctions for failing to meet the mark, as do a handful of chronically under-performing campuses.

The preliminary federal ratings come one week after HISD celebrated a record number of schools — 77 percent — achieved top ratings under the state system.

Although both rating systems are based largely on students’ scores on the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills, they often produce conflicting results.

Twenty-nine HISD campuses — including Challenge Early College High School and T.H. Rogers Elementary School, both rated exemplary by the state last week — failed to meet the federal mark.

HISD Superintendent Abelardo Saavedra lamented the conflicting accountability measures.

“The results are extremely confusing,” he said. “It does not make sense when schools that receive the state’s highest rating receive the federal government’s lowest rating and schools that receive the state’s lowest rating receive the federal government’s highest rating. We have long maintained that these two systems need to be aligned so that there is just one, clearly understood method for determining accountability.”

Good luck with that, whoever you are. And please note, the problem here may be with the state standards, or at least the way they’re computed, not the federal standards.

The secret Superintendent search continues

HISD continues its stealthy ways in seeking a replacement for outgoing Superintendent Abe Saavedra.

The Houston school board, trying to protect the candidates’ identities, will interview the job seekers behind closed doors at its headhunting firm’s downtown office.

The board is scheduled to call the meeting to order at 9 a.m. [today] in a conference room at Heidrick & Struggles, located on the 68th floor of the Chase Tower.

The public part of the meeting is expected to last a few minutes before trustees go into closed session to question the job candidates.

I still think this is ridiculous. What are they going to do, bring the candidates in with bags over their heads? What’s their plan in the event one or more names do get leaked? Just be open about it and you don’t have to worry about these things.

The Texas Open Meetings Act appears to allow the school board to meet anywhere that is “accessible to the public,” said Matthew Festa, an assistant professor at South Texas College of Law.

“I would say reasonably any place in Houston is accessible. Nothing says it has to be in the official chambers,” Festa said.

Seems to me to be a glaring weakness in the law as written. I hope someone remembers this in 2011.

Csorba said the public can attend the brief open session before the interviews, though he’s not expecting a crowd.

It would be awfully funny if he were to be proven wrong about that. Which leads to another question: What happens if someone shows up with a camera and an Internet connection? Would they throw him out? Would that be allowed under the Open Meetings Act given that this is taking place on private property? This very likely won’t happen, but if it does, we’ll all see the lawsuit coming a mile away.

The secret Superintendent search

Bad idea.

Houston ISD trustees decided this afternoon that they will release to the public only one name in the superintendent search — the person they intend to hire. The board, at the urging of its search firm, Heidrick & Struggles, said it will not divulge the names of any applicants or any people they interview for the taxpayer-funded job. They intend to name only one finalist.

Search consultant Les Csorba told the board many potential candidates have asked about confidentiality and are worried about their names being let out of the bag. “I think the most outstanding candidates are those actively involved in a leadership role right now where they have a number of risks associated with their potential candidacy,” Csorba told trustees. “Anything this board can do to reassure and reaffirm this confidentiality of the process would go a long way.”

I didn’t like this before, and I don’t like it now. If this is the norm for superintendent searches, then I think it’s a bad norm. This is a public position, and it should be filled in a manner that’s open to public scrutiny. Frankly, I’m not sure I buy Lee Csorba’s assertion about the need for confidentiality. If this is such a great opportunity that everyone knows about as he claims, then it’ll still be so if the candidates’ names are disclosed as part of the process. Wouldn’t it be nice to know what these candidates’ current colleagues think about them now, instead of after he or she gets hired? Besides, as Stace points out, what are the odds this will stay a secret all the way through? Do it in the open and save yourself the trouble, HISD.

By the way, Superintendent Abe Saavedra’s last day will be August 31, one week after the fall semester starts. It’d be nice to have a replacement in place by then.

Help choose the next HISD Superintendent

The HISD Board of Trustees will hold a series of eight public meetings to get feedback about what people want in their next Superintendent.

Heidrick & Struggles, the executive search firm hired by the schol board, will lead the community meetings and plans to use the input in its hunt for superintendent candidates.

Meetings also will be held with various business, faith-based, parent, educational and employee groups.

Trustees have set a goal of hiring a superintendent in July but have said the timeline is flexible.

The meeting schedule is as follows:

  • Today: 6:30 p.m., HISD South Region Office, 4040 W. Fuqua
  • Tuesday: 6:30 p.m., Bellaire High School, 5100 Maple
  • Wednesday: 6:30 p.m., Wheatley High School, 4801 Providence
  • Thursday: 6:30 p.m., Washington High School, 119 E. 39th
  • May 4: 6:30 p.m., Revere Middle School, 10502 Briar Forest
  • May 5: 6:30 p.m., Reagan High School, 413 E. 13th
  • May 7: 6:30 p.m., Deady Middle School, 2500 Broadway
  • May 9: 2 p.m., Ryan Middle School, 2610 Elgin

Please participate if you can.

Search openly

Is there really a debate about whether or not we should conduct a search for a new HISD Superintendent in an open manner? Because I think the choice is clear.

The Greater Houston Partnership, which represents the business community, is lobbying the school board to introduce a few leading contenders to the public — something the board hasn’t done in a search in nearly two decades.

“There are challenges to transparency, but the payout is huge,” said Jeff Moseley, president and chief executive of the business partnership.

[HISD President] Marshall said he supports naming multiple finalists — perhaps three — but not all his colleagues have been as quick to embrace the idea. Some worry fewer people will apply for the job if word of their job search will get back to their current school boards.

“I just think we need to stop using that as an excuse if we really and truly believe in transparency,” Marshall said. “Good superintendents can sit down with their boards and say, ‘Here’s an opportunity.’ I don’t think they add value to their candidacy by insisting on secrecy.”

Trustee Manuel Rodriguez Jr., on the other hand, prefers naming only one finalist.

“If the Greater Houston Partnership wants to know the candidates, they ought to run for school board,” he said. “By releasing the names of candidates, we put those candidates in jeopardy of losing their own jobs.”

Sorry, but I am unimpressed by Trustee Rodriguez’s argument here. Hell, college and pro coaches get vetted for other jobs all the time, usually with the knowledge and blessing of their current employer. Smaller programs generally consider it to be a positive when the bigger ones interview their coaches, because it’s a sign that they’re doing something right, and because being a place that provides opportunities for advancement is in itself a lure for good employees. I just don’t see the downside here.

And if that wasn’t enough, this would more than clinch it for me:

During the 2004 search that resulted in [Superintendent Abe] Saavedra’s hiring, board members conducted late-night interviews that ended with the candidates being hurried out of the administration building and into waiting cars. Extra HISD police officers were brought in to help keep track of reporters trying to catch a glimpse of the contenders.

In Florida, one of the most open states when it comes to superintendent searches, the names of all applicants are public record, and the community is allowed to attend meetings where school boards interview candidates.

Which one of these processes sounds healthier and more likely to produce a positive result? Seriously, this is an easy call.

Saavedra to step down

In 2010.

Houston ISD Superintendent Abelardo Saavedra plans to step down from his post by spring of 2010, he announced this morning.

“I have recently informed the school board of my intention to retire within the next year. I want to make sure that the board has adequate time to conduct a comprehensive national search for my successor,” he said in a written statement. “Selecting a superintendent is the most important decision that a board makes. Making the right decision ensures that the progress that we have made as a district, as a community, will continue forward. I have full confidence the board will select an individual that will take this district to the next level of performance.”

[…]

Saavedra has led Texas’ largest school district since June 2004, first serving as interim superintendent before being named the permanent chief a few months later. He is the Houston Independent School District’s first Hispanic superintendent.

Saavedra, who will turn 58 later this month, has had a rough run lately, from the district’s $805 million bond referendum barely passing in November 2007 to the recent parent outcry over his proposal to reduce busing to the popular magnet schools. Several school trustees have repeatedly criticized Saavedra’s poor community skills, saying he fails to reach out to the community and to the school board.

However, student test scores and school ratings under Saavedra’s tenure have generally risen, and the district announced last week that Saavedra’s performance earned him a $77,500 performance bonus on top of his annual $327,000 salary.

That more or less captures my opinion of the man. He’s done some very good things, and he’s done some things that have made me shake my head and say “What the hell was he thinking?” Whoever replaces him will have some big challenges, but will also have a system that has a lot of good things going for it. Building on those good things, replicating their own successes within the system, and improving on HISD’s openness and communications with its stakeholders will be the top priorities. Best of luck to Saavedra in whatever he wants to do next, and to HISD in finding his successor.