HISD | Employee News: HISD’s news for district employees

If so, and you are an HISD educator with at least three years of teaching experience, you should consider attending one of the information sessions being held at the Hattie Mae White Educational Support Center (4400 W. 18^th St., 77092).

There, you can learn more about the new partnership between HISD and the University of Houston (.pdf flyer here), which was created to offer aspiring leaders the opportunity to obtain a master’s degree in education with a focus on turnaround leadership.

Graduates of this one-year program will have the business, education, and management skills needed for leading successful urban schools—as well as for obtaining principal certification in the State of Texas.

Classes for the inaugural cohort start in the summer of 2013 and will be led by instructors from UH, HISD, and other experts in education.

Both information sessions will take place from 5 to 6 p.m. in the HMWESC cafeteria. Interested employees are asked to fill out this brief online form.

For more information, please contact Alejandro Morúa at 713-742-4925 or amorua@houstonisd.org.

In an organization the size of HISD, it’s sometimes easy for great departmental developments to get overlooked. That’s why a number of district departments have taken it upon themselves to create their own newsletters.

The University Interscholastic League Academics Department, for instance, has just launched a new quarterly publication for principals. Dubbed “The Contender,” it was designed to highlight various competitions and aspects of the UIL program.

“When schools join UIL, our primary communication is with the academic coordinator on their campus,” explained UIL Manager Don Hernandez. “However, some principals have said they would appreciate periodic communication from our office so that they can be kept informed with the activities of our department as well.”

The November 2012 edition (.pdf) of The Contender includes details on a new competition for campus leaders called the “Principal’s Cup,” as well as features on the Houston Urban Debate League and “the Big Kahuna of Texas theatre,” the One-Act Play.

The Office of Risk Management, meanwhile, has been publishing two safety newsletters per semester for more than a decade—one distributed to school-based staff (the Campus Safety Alert) and the other to Construction and Facilities Services employees (the Support Services Safety Link). Both contain useful safety information targeted to their respective audiences, but the latter is focused more on craft and maintenance issues.

If your department has a newsletter you’d like to publicize, please send us an email at info@houstonisd.org and let us know! Be sure to include details about how often it’s produced and where interested readers can find both current and past issues.

If you still haven’t signed up for your 2013 medical benefits, it’s not too late! Open Enrollment lasts through next Thursday, so be sure to make your selections before the Nov. 15 deadline.

Click here to access your interactive Benefits Enrollment Guide and here to enroll in Red Brick Health (a new tool designed to help you live your best life). You can also take advantage of the last benefits info session or enrollment lab being offered early next week.

Also, don’t forget that you can still register to participate in the Supplemental Sick Leave Bank, which provides up to 30 additional paid leave days in the event of a catastrophic illness or injury. The deadline to sign up for that benefit is also Nov. 15.

America may still be in the midst of a recession, but that didn’t stop HISD employees from giving to the charitable organizations they most wanted to support this year.

The total donations collected during the district’s 2012 Combined Charities initiative was $354,198, and the organization that received the most support this year was the United Way of Greater Houston, with a total of $67,652 in contributions.

Here is a breakdown of the departments and campuses with the highest pledge amounts:

Among non-campus-based work locations:

• 76 or more employees: Child Study $4,437
• 40 to 75 employees: Facility Services Admin $930
• 21 to 39 employees: Secondary Curriculum Instruct $3,877
• 1 to 20 employees:  Middle Schools Office $3,204

Among campus-based work locations:

• 206 or more employees: Bellaire High School $24,690
• 138 to 205 employees: Dowling Middle School $12,780
• 69 to 137 employees: Yates High School $6,261
• 1 to 68 employees: Anderson Elementary $6,413

“We are a very competitive campus, especially when it comes to doing good,” explained Dr. Roslyn Vaughn, whose staff at Anderson Elementary School raised slightly more money than a school twice its size. “We were up watching until midnight on the last day of the initiative. This is going to help so many people—kids going to college, doctors finding cures. Every day, we have to dig deeper academically to get the best out of our students, and that’s what I challenged my administrators and teachers to do here.”

HISD will mail 2012 W-2 forms to employees’ address of record during the last week of January.

To ensure you receive your form promptly, please make sure that HISD has your correct home address.

To update your address (as well as your phone number) using the HISD employee portal, follow these instructions:

• Click the “Employee Services” tab.
• Go to the “My Account” module, then click on the “Personal Data Maintenance” link.
• Enter the password you use to log on to the HISD employee portal and click the “Submit” button. Your home address and phone number will be displayed on the next screen.
• Make any necessary changes to your personal information and click the “Submit” button.

Please note: Changes will not be reflected online until the Monday after you receive your confirmation e-mail. Changes made after 4:00 p.m. on Friday, January 18, may not be processed before the W-2s are sent. If an employee’s W-2 goes to the wrong address, requests for replacements cannot be accepted until after the forms are initially sent out.

If you have trouble logging in or need technical assistance, please contact the Help Desk at 713-892-SERV (7378) or helpdesk@houstonisd.org.

 If you experience any difficulties with the “Change Personal Information” tool (e.g., the application tells you that your “Personal information is not available”), e-mail your correct address to the Human Resource AnswerLine (hranswerline@houstonisd.org).