College acceptance letters start arriving for members of Class of 2015

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Lamar senior Tyra Jenkins poses with the acceptance letter she received from Cornell University. Cornell is her dream school, and she plans to attend it in the fall.

Graduating seniors are starting to discover where their quest for higher education will take them this fall, as colleges and universities across the country are sending out letters of acceptance to those who applied for admission early.

More than two dozen students in the district’s EMERGE program have already received either early decision or early action notices from top tier schools, including Stanford, Notre Dame, Rice, Cornell, and Harvard.   Continue reading →

Senior challenges giving students extra incentive to apply to college

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Completing college and financial aid applications early often yields its own rewards, but for students at two HISD campuses, it could also mean a free ticket to the senior prom or a day spent shadowing an admired professional.

Sharpstown High School Principal Rob Gasparello launched the Senior Challenge at his campus last fall, and students who meet all criteria are eligible to attend both the senior prom and the annual senior trip for free.  Continue reading →

Missy the cow teaches students all about milk

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Larry Graham and Missy the cow show students where milk comes from.

Students may never look at a carton of milk the same way again after seeing firsthand where dairy milk comes from, thanks to farmer Larry Graham and his favorite cow, Missy.

Graham and L.P. Voskamp are instructors for the Southwest Dairy Farmers Mobile Dairy Classroom, an outreach program that teaches children about the dairy industry. Elmore Elementary School students recently learned how dairy foods contribute to good health, the anatomy of dairy cows, and how the milking process works. They also got to meet Missy up close. Continue reading →

HISD school nurses get additional training on preventing spread of flu

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HISD school nurses attended a training session recently on the best way to manage and prevent the spread of communicable diseases such as influenza.

In Texas, the flu is currently being reported at higher levels than this time last year. The same holds true for HISD, where more elementary school children have been diagnosed with the flu than other grade levels. Continue reading →

KBR pre-bid meeting provides networking opportunities for minority-owned businesses

KBR Building Group held a pre-bid meeting this week to get acquainted with representatives from minority- and women-owned business enterprises (M/WBEs) who have an interest in working on HISD building projects.

Continue reading →

Stay informed about wintry weather with HISD text alerts

With winter upon us, it’s a great time to sign up for HISD text alerts to receive updates on school weather conditions. Just text YES to 68453, and you will be enrolled in HISD text messaging. Texting provides instant access to the latest updates regarding school closures and other emergency situations.

Before you send your student out the door on a cold morning, be sure they are dressed in layers, including a scarf, gloves, and hat or hood. Dressing in layers allows them to adjust for varying temperatures throughout the school day, from waiting outside for the bus to learning inside the classroom.

For more information, go to the HISD texting homepage.

 

First-year school nurse revives campus club to encourage STEM careers

HISD’s Booker T. Washington High School is usually known for its magnet engineering program, but some students there have an interest in healthcare—and one first-year school nurse is helping them to explore it.

Members of the Booker T. Washington High School health club examine a sheep’s heart during a field trip to the Houston Health Museum.

Members of the Booker T. Washington High School health club examine a sheep’s heart during a field trip to the Houston Health Museum.

Worthing High School alumna Shara Fontaine, who joined Team HISD in 2014 after nine years as a labor and delivery nurse and a stint in the U.S. Air Force, resurrected the student health club at Washington last fall to better serve students with career aspirations in healthcare. The club now has about 15 members, and Fontaine has been coordinating special activities to further stoke their interest in that field. Continue reading →

DeBakey wins $7,500 grant in national H&R Block budget challenge

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The DeBakey High School for Health Professions recently received a $7,500 grant from the H&R Block Budget Challenge, a teen financial literacy program that rewards high school classes for mastering real-world budgeting and personal finance decision-making. H&R Block representatives presented campus leaders with a check at a special gathering held in December.

High school students and educators nationwide are competing this year to win a portion of $3 million in classroom grants, college scholarships, and cash prizes through the Challenge, which was created to help students learn to manage their money and become financially responsible adults. Continue reading →

Two alternative certification grads discuss what makes HISD’s program superior

Physics teacher Adeeb Barqawi works with his students at Kashmere High School.

Physics teacher Adeeb Barqawi works with his students at Kashmere High School.

The one thing most participants in HISD’s Alternative Certification Program have in common is that they did not originally plan to pursue a career in education. However, the desire to be a positive influence on children and the greater Houston community eventually brought them to the classroom, and to HISD.

Recently, we sat down with Cory Bates, a bilingual Pre-K teacher at Stevens Elementary School, and Adeeb Barqawi, a physics teacher at Kashmere High School, to reflect on their experiences in the district’s Alternative Certification Program, also known as the Effective Teacher Fellowship (ETF), and why they feel HISD’s program is superior to others. The deadline to apply to the next Effective Teacher Fellowship cohort is Saturday, Jan. 31, 2015.  Continue reading →

Student Congress giving high school kids a voice in their own education

Speaker of the Congress Zaakir Tameez (lower left) poses with members of the Student Congress at the Dec. 11 Board of Education meeting.

Speaker of the Congress Zaakir Tameez (lower left) poses with members of the Student Congress at the Dec. 11 Board of Education meeting.

A group of juniors and seniors from four HISD campuses is on a mission to give their peers a voice in public education—and they have created a new Student Congress to do it.

More than a dozen students from Bellaire, Carnegie Vanguard, Lamar, and Yates high schools founded the congress last spring, after participating in senior Zaakir Tameez’s Texas Performance Standards Project at Carnegie Vanguard.

“We were originally called ‘Our Shared Future’ and talked about current events,” explains Outreach Chair Amy Fan, now a junior at Bellaire High School. “But as we met with city leaders from all over Houston, our conversations would constantly lead back to education. Yet the only people with whom we could share our critiques was each other.” Continue reading →