Category Archives: School days

TAB does not intend to release its hostage

Posted on November 6, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

And why should they, if it’s a viable strategy? Representatives from the Texas Coalition for a Competitive Workforce, which includes major business groups and local chambers of commerce, said at a news conference that the assessment and accountability system known … Continue reading →

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Eight billion dollars

Posted on October 31, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

That’s how much is needed per year to make public education whole. Lynn Moak told state District Judge John Dietz that it will take more than $8 billion a year in additional money to get students on target to graduate … Continue reading →

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Patrick teases his school choice proposals

Posted on October 30, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

He doesn’t want to call it “vouchers”, but if it walks like a duck… “If there’s one message that I want to send, it’s that I want to champion public education,” said Patrick, the new chairman of the Senate Public … Continue reading →

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The opening argument against vouchers

Posted on October 28, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

We’ve been hearing about vouchers since Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst named Sen. Dan Patrick to be Chair of the Senate Education Committee, but we haven’t heard – or at least, I haven’t seen – a lot of information about what … Continue reading →

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Downtown schools

Posted on October 14, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

The Chron notes downtown’s continuing evolution. Last week’s announcement of plans for a Nau Center for Texas Cultural Heritage marked the latest in a string of developments in the decades-long march in the evolution of about 50 square blocks west … Continue reading →

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Pauken responds to Hammond

Posted on September 30, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

Tom Pauken responds to Bill Hammond on the subject of school accountability. Hammond encourages us to “stay the course” of the existing high-stakes testing system and “4×4” curriculum that have come to dominate public education in Texas. Implicit in this … Continue reading →

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Fort Bend ISD goes BYOD

Posted on September 27, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

Students in the Fort Bend Independent School District may now bring their own mobile device to class to connect to the school’s WiFi and be part of the curriculum. Fort Bend ISD’s policy allows students to use electronic devices to … Continue reading →

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Hammond pushes back on Pauken

Posted on September 21, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

After I read Patti Hart’s column about Tom Pauken and his anti-standardized testing quest, I noted the absence of a mention of uber-testing advocate Bill Hammond. Hammond has no trouble talking about Pauken, however. Tom Pauken, former chairman of the … Continue reading →

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Pauken on testing

Posted on September 19, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

Patricia Kilday Hart has a conversation with Texas Workforce Commission Chair Tom Pauken about testing and accountability in public schools. As a Texas Workforce Commissioner, Pauken has spent a lot of time studying whether our public school system prepares an … Continue reading →

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HISD board passes ethics reform

Posted on September 15, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

It was a unanimous vote at Thursday’s board meeting. Under the new rules, which will be finalized next month, trustees will have to abstain from voting on deals involving vendors who contributed at least $500 to their political campaigns the … Continue reading →

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HISD board to vote on ethics reform

Posted on September 13, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

Good. Houston ISD trustees would have to abstain from voting on deals involving big campaign donors and disclose potential conflicts of interest with a wider range of vendors under new policies up for consideration Thursday. The board has been working … Continue reading →

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Focusing on reading

Posted on August 31, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

This sounds promising. When HISD Superintendent Terry Grier took charge three years ago, he quickly latched onto a troubling statistic: roughly 70,000 of the district’s students were not reading at grade level. Students who should have learned reading basics by … Continue reading →

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On comparing school districts

Posted on August 29, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

Easier said than done. The way the state distributes money to school districts, and how much, will be center stage when a trial begins this fall involving more than half of the state’s districts serving the majority of its students, … Continue reading →

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Perry gives another middle finger to public education

Posted on August 28, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

It’s a twofer, actually. Here’s one. Gov. Rick Perry named Michael Williams the new commissioner of the Texas Education Agency Monday. A fixture of Texas Republican politics — and a former general counsel to the Republican Party of Texas — … Continue reading →

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Some things are not easily replicated

Posted on August 23, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

I have three things to say about this. Harmony Public Schools appears to have cracked the code. The charter school system, with 38 campuses across Texas and more than 23,000 students, regularly produces students who excel at math, science and … Continue reading →

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Once again on charter school facilities

Posted on August 21, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

David Dunn of the Texas Charter Schools Association writes another op-ed about funding for charter school facilities. The Texas Charter Schools Association has looked at the needs of public school students whose parents have chosen the option of public charter … Continue reading →

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HISD takes another crack at ethics reform

Posted on August 20, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

Good luck. Houston school trustees on Thursday renewed serious talks about tightening their ethics rules after failing to agree on new policies late last year. The proposed changes, meant to restore public confidence that the Houston Independent School District is … Continue reading →

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Some children left behind

Posted on August 13, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

Oops. Nearly half the public schools across Texas failed to meet tougher federal academic standards this year, according to preliminary data released Wednesday. The failures spiked sharply from last year, when a quarter of the state’s schools missed the mark. … Continue reading →

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HCC board approves its bond package

Posted on August 12, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

More bonds for your consideration this fall. Houston Community College trustees voted Thursday to placea $425 million bond referendum on the November ballot. If approved by voters on Nov. 6, the bond would help update classroom technology, build a new … Continue reading →

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HISD board approves its bond package

Posted on August 11, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

In the end, it wasn’t a close vote. The school board voted 8-1 to seek a $1.9 billion bond issue that would rebuild or renovate most of the district’s aging high schools, remodel several elementary and middle schools, and upgrade … Continue reading →

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HISD tweaks its bond proposal

Posted on August 5, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

HISD Superintendent Terry Grier presents Bond Referendum 2.0 for your approval. Grier’s amended proposal adds five high schools to a list of 20 that would get new buildings or partial replacements. The additions, originally slated for smaller renovations, are Davis, … Continue reading →

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Who sets the standard for science?

Posted on July 25, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

I don’t get the fuss over this. Many say students need to be science literate so they can innovate, compete and maneuver with the latest technology. If the United States wants to compete on the world stage, teachers and science … Continue reading →

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HISD graduation rate up

Posted on July 20, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

Good news. Students in the Houston Independent School District are graduating at a higher rate for the fourth straight year, thanks in part to better tracking and online make-up courses, Superintendent Terry Grier said Monday. The district reported a graduation … Continue reading →

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How big should those high schools be?

Posted on July 13, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

This is a question that HISD is asking itself as the Board of Trustees considers the $1.9 billion bond proposal, much of which is to be spent on high schools. A number of HISD high schools have had large drops … Continue reading →

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Jamaal Smith: Cracking Down on For-Profit Colleges in Southwest Houston

Posted on July 6, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

The following is from a series of guest posts that I will be presenting over the next few weeks. I come from a family of educators. Four out of five of my aunts were teachers, and my wife is currently … Continue reading →

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How much would you pay for that high school?

Posted on July 6, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

Some cost more than others, but that doesn’t mean they’re not worth it. Supporters of Houston’s nationally recognized High School for the Performing and Visual Arts have lobbied for 15 years for a larger, more modern building. They could get … Continue reading →

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Erica Lee: How to Keep a First Grader Off Death Row

Posted on June 29, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

The following is from a series of guest posts that I will be presenting over the next few weeks. It is the beginning of the school year and excitement is in the air. Children are looking for their classmates in … Continue reading →

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Bond concerns

Posted on June 28, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

Early reactions to the HISD bond proposal that was unveiled last week. “I think in the long run any anti-tax opposition will make it a close race,” said state Sen. Mario Gallegos, D-Houston, predicting that Hispanics could swing the vote. … Continue reading →

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HISD will not raise the tax rate

Posted on June 23, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

Instead, they will dip into their reserves to balance their $1.5 billion budget for this year. The amount is about the same as last year, when the district reduced spending by approximately 5 percent to offset unprecedented state cuts. Instead … Continue reading →

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STAAR pushback

Posted on June 22, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

The House Public Ed committee gets an earful. Members of the House Public Education Committee on Tuesday questioned why the first batch of students who took the end-of-course exams scored so poorly. For example, 55 percent of ninth-graders met the … Continue reading →

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Not a great start for the STAAR tests

Posted on June 9, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

Whatever we think about standardized tests, we’ll need to do better than this. Thousands of Houston-area high school students failed the state’s new standardized exams and must retake them – or risk not graduating. Preliminary test results released by several … Continue reading →

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Are the end of course standards too low?

Posted on June 8, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

Beginning this year, high school students must pass new end of course exams in a variety of subjects in order to be able to graduate. These tests begin in the ninth grade and continue through the 12th. The standards will … Continue reading →

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Two more ways to divert money from public schools

Posted on May 23, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

Number One: Taxpayer-funded scholarships to private schools. When the Georgia legislature passed a private school scholarship program in 2008, lawmakers promoted it as a way to give poor children the same education choices as the wealthy. The program would be … Continue reading →

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On food in the classroom

Posted on May 3, 2012 by Charles Kuffner

Bettina has had enough. See here and here for the context. I hate to go “back in my day” on you again, but I cannot recall a single time in my school days when we had any kind of food, … Continue reading →

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