Abbott sends down his next lackey

My vote would be for someone that is competent, has no outside self interests and has the best interests of the students, teachers, administrators, community, etc. at heart.

But I realize that's a pipe dream.

HISD...both the state it is in now and the state it was in prior to Miles taking over.....is the reason I just shrug when I hear teachers and administrators whine about compensation and state funding.

Initially, I thought OK sweeping changes needed to be made with HISD. I also felt Miles was probably put in to make improvements quickly. The problem I have - is that he didn't take any time to evaluate what was working and what was not. He doesn't listen to anyone let alone Teachers and Principals at high performing schools. His board that as I understand just basically rubber stamps all of his sweeping changes is comprised of appointed/highered members and no elected members from the community HISD serves. The people of the community have no voice or representation, the current staff of Teachers and Principals apparently have no voice and Miles does not seem to be interested in listening.

If he and his charter schools are funneling TX Tax Payer money to Colorado - that is a huge problem.

Miles fired last year's "Principal of the Year" -
Houston Chronicle article

He was fired.

chico said:

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Miles fired last year's "Principal of the Year" -
Houston Chronicle article

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And? She won a popularity contest last year at one of the worst performing ISDs in the country. Doesn't matter if you're the top guy, new boss comes in and you don't get on board, you lose your job.

This is what no one seems to get. It doesn't matter how well you are liked or what award you won. If you don't get on board with changes you shouldn't have a job. Miles is there because HISD failed Houston children. Period.

So all the teachers and administrators fighting the change and saying HISD should be left alone should be the first one's gone. Regardless of if I like the new boss or not.

It's a joke watching parents "rally behind the teachers". Rally behind your kids instead and HISD being taken over by the state means just about everything will be blown up and redone. Even the successful programs because the money and staffing has to go to the failing areas. But instead of being pissed at the teachers and administration (including the nice guy principal) that put HISD in this situation, they'll just blame the guy tasked with fixing it.

sounds pretty familiar

https://www.dallasnews.com/news/education/2015/06/24/disruption-scandals-clashes-had-dogged-dallas-isds-mike-miles/

https://www.dallasnews.com/news/education/2015/06/24/dallas-isd-chief-mike-miles-announces-resignation-after-contract-changes-rejected/

sushi94 said:

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He doesn't listen to anyone let alone Teachers and Principals at high performing schools.

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Are those schools performing highly because of the teachers and principals or because of the socioeconomics of the surrounding area/demographics feeding into the schools?

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this clown doesn't care about fixing the budget.

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That's not why he was brought in. He was brought in because of low performing schools. I don't know enough about his specific policies but is this any worse than the board that got replaced? Basically D-level Democratic politicians factionalized in hispanic versus black, with a token white limousine liberal going off on some feel-good policies when the two dominate wings were engaged in the sole mission of winning and making sure the other side lost.

What's the saying, "Elections have Consequences?" Well, this is the result of voting for the same board year after year. There was warning after warning. The state also provided a number of viable solutions to avoid this. But when none of those were implemented and the board was faced with an ultimatum from the state, all they had to do was close one school and this is avoided. But they couldn't even manage that so here we are.

I was responding to a poster that specifically mentioned the budget, but solid rant.

CheeseSndwch said:

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sushi94 said:

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He doesn't listen to anyone let alone Teachers and Principals at high performing schools.

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Are those schools performing highly because of the teachers and principals or because of the socioeconomics of the surrounding area/demographics feeding into the schools?

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What I have heard is that he is looking to get do away with Carnegie Vangard HS, Debakey HS, and HSPVA.

CVHS is #1 in HISD, #3 in TX, and I think #31 in the US for public HS.

Sure there are advantages based on socioeconomics/demographics feeding into certain "local" schools - more important is parent involvment in my opinion. I also think that if a parent in a socioeconomically disadvantaged area or poor demographic is willing to make the sacrifice and commitment to find a better option for their child within the district they should have that opportunity. Those that don't care - well make the best of your local school.

sushi94 said:

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CheeseSndwch said:

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sushi94 said:

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He doesn't listen to anyone let alone Teachers and Principals at high performing schools.

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Are those schools performing highly because of the teachers and principals or because of the socioeconomics of the surrounding area/demographics feeding into the schools?

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What I have heard is that he is looking to get do away with Carnegie Vangard HS, Debakey HS, and HSPVA.

CVHS is #1 in HISD, #3 in TX, and I think #31 in the US for public HS.

Sure there are advantages based on socioeconomics/demographics feeding into certain "local" schools - more important is parent involvment in my opinion. I also think that if a parent in a socioeconomically disadvantaged area or poor demographic is willing to make the sacrifice and commitment to find a better option for their child within the district they should have that opportunity. Those that don't care - well make the best of your local school.

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Carnegie, HSPVA and DeBakey are all terrific and should be applauded. My oldest went to HSPVA back when it was in Montrose and we were very pleased. The socioeconomic was quite mixed, certainly not all from wealthy families. It's a very demanding program. Every kid has to qualify to get in, no local kids auto-admitted to all 3 schools.
Was it this year that Debakey didn't have a physics teacher so the students ended up teaching it to themselves? I believe they finally hired a physics teacher....

They were interviewing a parent at Crockett Elementary off Sawyer who also had their principal fired last night and she said she had already scheduled with her child's therapist in order to "make it through the rest of the week, let alone the rest of the school year." How much interaction does any elementary school child have with the principal? And if they do, they probably need to have a lot more therapy.

not a ton of "Ayden's" at Meyerland Middle School, Crockett and Neff Elementary (where these folks are getting canned).

Don't see how getting rid of a performing and well-liked principal accomplishes your wealth distribution goal. They'll still need to backfill him.

My suspicion is it's more similar to another poster's theory that Mile's doesn't tolerate anyone who doesn't get in line.

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He's going to rob from the rich to give to the poor including budget and more importantly staff and resources. All the magnet and high performing programs "that work" are going to cannibalized to reallocate resources to fix the problem across the board the upper middle class have so greatly avoided.

The point is to fix the school district, not to provide a safe haven for Ayden so their parents can brag about sending their kids and supporting public schools while bussing the across town or hide them in gifted and talented away from the general population.

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so, the solution to fix the bad schools, is to dilute the positive aspects of the good schools into the overall system that is still a disaster? good call, comrade.

lost in all of this is that the "good schools" are generally so because of the involvement of the community around them. that does not transfer by distributing staff or funding from those schools to sh*tty schools. you just end up with masses of higher quality teachers exiting the system.

agreed. The PTO's end up having to subsidize a lot of the supplemental things at public schools. Just being present is a big part of it as well.

Shelling the "good" schools will just encourage the parents to leave the district, and it will be a death spiral for HISD.

The cynical side of me thinks this is the goal.

Diggity said:

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agreed. The PTO's end up having to subsidize a lot of the supplemental things at public schools. Just being present is a big part of it as well.

Shelling the "good" schools will just encourage the parents to leave the district, and it will be a death spiral for HISD.

The cynical side of me thinks this is the goal.

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the cynical side of me agrees -

Absolutely the goal.

Abbott sent Miles to blow up HISD, not fix it.

Follow the money.

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How much interaction does any elementary school child have with the principal?

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Ours have a ton. Our principal is wonderful and is very involved with all the kids on a direct, face to face basis. It would be crushing if he was canned.

same. our principal is a huge part of what makes our school so good. very visible and very involved.

Diggity said:

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My suspicion is it's more similar to another poster's theory that Mile's doesn't tolerate anyone who doesn't get in line.

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This is what I'm hearing - if you give a different opinion than Miles - you will be shown the door.

AgLA06 said:

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Diggity said:

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I was responding to a poster that specifically mentioned the budget, but solid rant.

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He's going to rob from the rich to give to the poor including budget and more importantly staff and resources. All the magnet and high performing programs "that work" are going to cannibalized to reallocate resources to fix the problem across the board the upper middle class have so greatly avoided.

The point is to fix the school district, not to provide a safe haven for Ayden so their parents can brag about sending their kids and supporting public schools while bussing the across town or hide them in gifted and talented away from the general population.

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So your solution is to lower the bar for the good performing schools int he district in order to basically make the lower performing schools look better.

Solid tactic there, you should be on a school board with that mentality.

That is not a solution, that is amplifying the problem.

When you have a leak in one of your tires, you don't poke holes in the other 3 so that the one leaking doesnt' look bad - you fuggin fix the tire that is leaking. That's what needs to be done to the failing schools - you don't gut a good performing school to make marginal changes in a substandard school. You focus your efforts on identifying the underlying issues, address the actual issues (regardless of how politically incorrect it may be) and establish a plan to fix said issues. Then you implement the plan.

AgLA06 said:

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chico said:

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Miles fired last year's "Principal of the Year" -
Houston Chronicle article

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And? She won a popularity contest last year at one of the worst performing ISDs in the country. Doesn't matter if you're the top guy, new boss comes in and you don't get on board, you lose your job.

This is what no one seems to get. It doesn't matter how well you are liked or what award you won. If you don't get on board with changes you shouldn't have a job. Miles is there because HISD failed Houston children. Period.

So all the teachers and administrators fighting the change and saying HISD should be left alone should be the first one's gone. Regardless of if I like the new boss or not.

It's a joke watching parents "rally behind the teachers". Rally behind your kids instead and HISD being taken over by the state means just about everything will be blown up and redone. Even the successful programs because the money and staffing has to go to the failing areas. But instead of being pissed at the teachers and administration (including the nice guy principal) that put HISD in this situation, they'll just blame the guy tasked with fixing it.

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If the change is a bad change, should the teachers just go with it or get fired? This reasoning seems a bit too simplistic, in my view.

In summary
1. HISD voters put a system in place that allowed a few schools to be awesome and the rest to be crap.
2. State warned them that they needed to improve the bad schools if they wanted to continue receiving state money.
3. Wealthy voters refused to give up their magnet schools and poor voters refused enforcement of standards that would prevent Junior from graduating.
4. State warned HISD again
5. Voters and district refused to change
6. State takes over.
7. Miles is now changing the magnets under his terms because the voters and district refused to do it under their terms.

Wealthy voters were content to have their kids at the magnet schools while the regular schools were ignored. But when you are part of a very large political organization (city, county, school district), the money goes to the most needed place. Magnet schools soak up all the good teachers, and the other schools suffer. Wealthy want to have their city proximity and "free" private-school level educations. I don't blame them, but that arrangement does not meet state requirements of prioritizing all the kids passing. Because voters chose a system that didn't get good overall results, they don't get to vote how state money gets spent anymore.

Once Miles is done, the Debakery HS Harvard admit will only get into t.u. but 3 high school drop outs will graduate at other schools. And that's the price we pay for choosing incompetent leaders in the past. Since HISD voters refused to fix our problems, we no longer get a say in how those problems are fixed and get to deal with Miles. I think Miles will have more HS graduates even if wealthy start to pull out their kids. As long as that happens, Miles should be commended for his work to achieve the #1 goal.

TexAgs1992 said:

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schmellba99 said:

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herb96 said:

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wessimo said:

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GTFO.gif

Unbelievable. This POS needs to go. How could they put someone with such an obvious conflict of interest in this job?

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Abbot is hell bent on killing the public school system.

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To be fair, the public school system needs to be killed and rebuilt at this point.

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SCHOOL. CHOICE. EOT

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it exists within HISD, you can apply to any school district-wide. Many kids don't go to their zoned schools. You don't always get accepted since there are max enrollments, but you'll find some schools have kids from all over.