HISD Board of Education to swear in new members

Trustees also will consider turnaround plans for schools in second-year Improvement Required status

The Houston Independent School District Board of Education on Thursday will swear in three new trustees – Elizabeth Santos (District I), Sergio Lira (District III) and Susan Deigaard (District V) – and re-elected trustees Wanda Adams, Anne Sung, and Holly Maria Flynn Vilaseca.

Santos won the seat vacated by Anna Eastman. Deigaard won the seat vacated by Michael L. Lunceford. Both Eastman and Lunceford chose not to run for re-election. Lira will fill the unexpired term of the late District III Trustee Manuel Rodríguez Jr., which runs through 2019. Continue reading →

HISD schools, offices closed Wednesday due to inclement weather conditions

Offices expected to reopen and classes expected to resume on Thursday

Houston Independent School District schools and offices will be closed Wednesday, Jan. 17 as a precautionary measure because of inclement weather and the related potential for dangerous road conditions.

HISD officials have been monitoring the weather forecast and have determined that continuing icy road conditions across the Houston area may make for dangerous driving on Wednesday morning. As a result, all HISD schools and district administrative offices will be closed Wednesday as a precautionary measure.

Schools and offices are expected to reopen at their regularly scheduled time on Thursday, Jan. 18.

For additional information, visit www.houstonisd.org, call the HISD Inclement Weather Hotline at 713-556-9595, or follow the district on Twitter and Facebook: www.twitter.com/houstonisd and www.facebook.com/houstonisd. If you are an HISD parent or employee with a phone number registered in the HISD system, you also can sign up for HISD text alerts by texting YES to 68453.

HISD schools, offices closed Tuesday due to inclement weather conditions

Offices expected to reopen and classes expected to resume on Wednesday

Houston Independent School District schools and offices will be closed Tuesday, Jan. 16 as a precautionary measure because of inclement weather and the related potential for dangerous road conditions.

HISD officials have been monitoring the weather forecast and have determined that icy road conditions across the Houston area may make for dangerous driving on Tuesday. As a result, all HISD schools and district administrative offices will be closed Tuesday as a precautionary measure.

Schools and offices are expected to reopen at their regularly scheduled time on Wednesday, Jan. 17.

For additional information, visit www.houstonisd.org, call the HISD Inclement Weather Hotline at 713-556-9595, or follow the district on Twitter and Facebook: www.twitter.com/houstonisd and www.facebook.com/houstonisd. If you are an HISD parent or employee with a phone number registered in the HISD system, you also can sign up for HISD text alerts by texting YES to 68453.

Olivia Casares named new principal of Lyons Elementary School

Olivia Casares has been selected as the new principal for Lyons Elementary School. Casares is a veteran educator with 23 years of experience. Prior to joining HISD, she began her career as a bilingual elementary teacher in the Point Isabel School District. She later took on the same role at Love Elementary School in HISD. She joined the Lyons staff in 1999 and in 2005 was named the North District Bilingual Teacher of the Year. For the last seven years, she has served in the role of Assistant Principal at Lyons. Casares earned a Bachelor of Arts in Sociology from the University of Texas-Brownsville and a Masters in Educational Administration from Concordia University. 

Henderson ES site of first elementary school salad bar  

When students at J.P. Henderson Elementary returned from the holiday break, they were met with a healthy new option in the cafeteria: a salad bar filled with crisp lettuce, fresh cheese, and cool cucumbers.

Henderson Elementary is the first elementary school in the district to have a salad bar included in its meal options. Nutrition Services plans on adding salad bars to another 22 elementary schools before spring break.  Continue reading →

Superintendent to deliver keynote address at HISD State of the Schools luncheon

The Houston Independent School District will hold its annual State of the Schools luncheon, sponsored by Chevron, on Thursday, Feb. 15, 2018. The theme is Rebuild + Reimagine – highlighting how stakeholder support can help HISD rebuild from the devastation of Hurricane Harvey and reimagine educational opportunities for Houston children.

The event will take place from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. in the fourth-floor ballroom of the Hilton Americas-Houston Hotel (1600 Lamar, 77010). Superintendent Richard Carranza will deliver the keynote address to nearly 1,500 members of Houston’s business, non-profit, and faith-based communities.

State of the Schools, hosted by the HISD Foundation, is an opportunity for business and civic leaders and other community partners to hear about district achievements and challenges from the past year and learn about district priorities, which include innovating teaching and learning in every classroom; uplifting historically underserved schools; bringing wraparound services to every community; and sparking young imaginations with the expansion of fine arts.

This year’s State of the Schools luncheon will benefit the Foundation’s Innovation Fund, which provides grants for teachers and schools to purchase equipment, supplies, and other items to enhance innovative teaching and learning in the classroom. Innovative projects completed by students from elementary, middle, and high schools across the district will be featured before the event in the “Innovation Zone” outside the fourth-floor ballroom.

In addition to Carranza’s keynote address, the event will feature various student performance and welcome remarks from 2018 Board of Education President Rhonda Skillern-Jones.

Those who are unable to attend but want to follow along may watch the address streamed live online at HoustonISD.org, Facebook.com/HoustonISD, and HoustonISD.org/LiveTV.

Follow us on Twitter — @HoustonISD and @HISDEspanol — to experience highlights from the event as they happen.

 

Gregory-Lincoln ES student wins annual Martin Luther King Jr. Oratory Competition

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Gregory-Lincoln Elementary School fifth-grader Tchanori Kone channeled the composed, fighting spirit of her civil rights activist grandfather, Ester King, with her winning speech about her dream to improve the lives of the poor and grant equal and fair access to health care and education for all.

Kone, a native Houstonian, won first place for her speech titled “Making the Dream Come True” at the 22nd annual Martin Luther King Jr. Oratory Competition. Twelve fourth- and fifth-graders from two dozen HISD schools competed in the event, which challenged them to answer the question “What is your dream for today’s world?” with original speeches.

Continue reading →

HISD news blog named to tech company’s Top 30 Houston Blogs and Websites list

The HISD news blog recently was named by Feedspot as one of its Top 30 Houston Blogs and Websites.

The HISD news blog ranked 9th overall, just after the Houston Museum of Natural Science and one spot above Swamplot: Houston’s Real Estate Landscape. Read the entire list here. The best Houston blogs were chosen from thousands using search and social metrics, including the following criteria: Continue reading →

HISD Police Department adds emergency equipment to its fleet 

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Just in time for the new year, the HISD Police Department received a donation of kayaks, rescue gear and other emergency equipment secured by District II Board Trustee Rhonda Skillern-Jones.

“During Hurricane Harvey, I witnessed our police department’s efforts assisting people get to higher ground using every resource we had – buses, SUVs and cars,” Trustee Skillern-Jones said.  “If we are going to be a part of rescue efforts, we need to ensure our officers are equipped with safe equipment that allows them do so.”   Continue reading →

HISD to standardize school start times for the 2018-19 school year

HISD will implement standardized school start times for the 2018-19 school year to better deliver efficient, reliable, and affordable transportation to our students.

Currently, HISD manages 67 different school start times – the highest in the state – as it transports nearly 36,000 students on almost 1,200 different routes each day. Beginning next fall, the district will operate with two standardized start/dismissal times:

  • 7:30 a.m.-2:50 p.m. for elementary schools and K-8 campuses
  • 8:30 a.m.-3:50 p.m. for all secondary campuses (middle school, high school, and grade 6-12 campuses)

(Some specialty campuses may have alternate start/dismissal times that will be communicated directly from the campus.)

HISD gathered parent and principal input on the new start times through surveys conducted in October, and the results support the new start times, which were listed as Option 4 in the surveys. Of the 154 respondents to a survey of principals, 78, or 51%, chose Option 4. Of 17,138 respondents to a survey of parents, 7,932, or 46%, chose Option 4.

 

Standardizing school start times will bring efficiencies to the district’s bus routes and ensure that students arrive to campus and depart on time, resulting in fewer interruptions to teaching, learning, and family schedules. The new start times will also extend the life of the district’s bus fleet and reduce maintenance and fuel costs.