HISD Scholars Banquet honors Class of 2016 valedictorians and salutatorians HISD paid tribute to 99 high school seniors at the top of their class at the annual Scholars Banquet on April 12 at the Westin Oaks Galleria. In addition to their outstanding academic achievements, these valedictorians and salutatorians have already garnered more than $10 million in scholarships and financial aid offers.
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As concrete walls go up and steel framing is erected, the Milby High School community can now see the future of their new campus beginning to take shape.
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The 267,000-square-foot project along Broadway Street in Houston’s East End is a combination of new construction and renovation, allowing the school to maintain its historical structure while also creating a modern learning environment for up to 2,000 students.
“All of the tilt walls and concrete walls have now been completed,” said HISD’s Project Manager Mark Crippen. ”It seems as if it takes forever to complete, but once construction starts, it moves pretty quickly.”
Lovett ES fifth-grader Bryan Moore poses with his mother, Tonyamas Moore, who won the spelling bee at that campus back in 1986.
Five boys and five girls from 10 different HISD schools will be testing the limits of their vocabulary on Saturday, April 2, when they take part in the finals of the Houston Public Media spelling bee. The top two winners of the Houston-area competition will be eligible to advance to the Scripps National Spelling Bee near Washington, D.C., in May.
This year’s local contest is particularly meaningful for two HISD students: fifth-grader Bryan Moore (Lovett ES) and eighth-grader Christine Bowyer (Baylor College of Medicine Academy at Ryan).
The Houston Museum of Natural Science (HMNS) unveiled its newly renovated Burke Baker Planetarium on March 11, and roughly 75 of HISD’s Southmayd Elementary School’s fourth-graders were the first to experience it.
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Through a long-standing partnership with the museum, all 14,000 HISD fourth-graders take a field trip there each year, but the planetarium now boasts a new seamless inner surface on the dome and a high-resolution, digital-laser projection system so powerful only astronauts will have a better view of celestial objects.
Last spring, HISD, Young Audiences of Houston, the City of Houston, and more than 30 community arts organizations announced a new partnership — the Arts Access Initiative (AAI) — that has been providing additional arts-education programming to 10 elementary schools and one middle school. In late March, the AAI will announce 14 new HISD schools selected from around 40 applicants that will join the existing AAI cohort in 2016–2017.
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The first district schools to benefit from AAI are: Atherton, Benbrook, Eliot, Hartsfield, Hines-Caldwell, Kashmere Gardens, Memorial, Mitchell, Scarborough, and Whittier elementary schools, as well as Hamilton Middle School.
Detail of “Young Souls,” by Bellaire High School student Blanca Barrios. Image courtesy MFAH.
Art-loving Houstonians can see the world through the eyes of more than three dozen HISD students this spring, thanks to an exhibit at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (MFAH) that is returning for its 21st year.
Formerly known as “Eye on Third Ward” and limited to photographs taken by Yates HS students, “Eye on Houston” formally opened on Jan. 12 this year in MFAH’s Audrey Jones Beck Building (5601 Main Street, 77005), and features photographs taken by 37 students from five different HISD campuses. Those students are all juniors or seniors at Bellaire, Chávez, Westside, and Yates high schools, or the Sam Houston Math, Science & Technology Center.
The exhibition will be on display through Sunday, May 1, 2016.
The HISD Board of Education is searching for a new superintendent, and trustees want input from community members about the qualities and traits they would like to see in the next district leader.
The board has hired Hazard, Young, Attea & Associates to assist in the superintendent search process. The Illinois-based firm is conducting a survey (which you can find here) and helping trustees host a series of community meetings in March to gather input from various district stakeholders. Feedback obtained from those meetings will be used by trustees to finalize their superintendent profile and begin searching for candidates.
The Black College Expo is making its return to Houston on Saturday, and many HISD middle and high school students are taking advantage of higher education opportunities days before the big event.
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College recruiters and representatives from historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) will be available from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday at the Power Center (12401 South Post Oak Road, 77045) to provide students and parents with one-on-one counseling, as well as scholarship and financial aid information. HISD students and parents can attend the event for free.
Thursday, Feb. 25
Saturday, Feb. 27
The Houston Independent School District Board of Education is searching for a new superintendent and trustees want input from community members about the qualities and traits they would like to see in their next district leader.
HISD Board of Education President Manuel Rodríguez Jr. and Trustee Diana Dávila have scheduled seven meetings this week to gather feedback from the community that will be used to develop a superintendent candidate profile. The dates and times for additional meetings hosted by other trustees will be announced soon.
DeAnda ES parents (pictured) were able to purchase books at discounted prices from local retailers after obtaining library cards from the Houston Public Library, thanks to a special arrangement made by Principal Erwin Garcia Velazquez.
Last month, HISD began honoring district campuses for their successful implementation of the Family Friendly Schools program.
Now, four more campuses have been recognized by the Family and Community Engagement (FACE) Department for their efforts to make parents feel welcome and valued at their children’s schools.