If you are a taxpayer who lives in the Houston Independent School District, along with the inundation of political warfare from around the country you have also been asked to approve a $4.4 billion bond issue–this by a district that has been shrinking in enrollment steadily over the past 20 years and is expected to […]

“The Texas Legislature now has enough votes to pass school choice.”–Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, May 29, 2024 This statement might very well be true based on the success of the Governor in flipping 13 Republican seats in the May 28 Texas Republican primary runoff held by Republican reps who had been NO votes on the […]

We might all circle the March 5, 2024 primary election as the beginning of a revolution in Texas education reform that could have major impact across the country.  Governor Greg Abbott’s campaign to take out the 21 incumbent Republican representatives who had voted NO on school choice in the most recent legislative session was a […]

After four special Texas legislative sessions that featured a bill to enable Texas children to have school choice that would empower them to meet their particular needs, the bill failed in the House.  As you probably are aware, this proposal was Governor Greg Abbott’s highest legislative priority and, over the past 30 or so years […]

I am reminded from several sources that 2023 marks the 40th anniversary of the landmark report of the Department of Education, “A Nation at Risk”, the provocative conclusion of which reads: “If an unfriendly foreign power had attempted to impose on America the mediocre educational performance that exists today, we might well have viewed it […]

If you live in Texas and believe that school choice by which state funding follows the student to the public or private education provider that best meets his or her needs is important, the current legislative session is the best opportunity we have had in decades to make this a reality.  Senate Bill 8, the […]

The Texas Legislature has convened for its biannual 140-day run and public education, unlike anytime in recent memory, has taken center stage in public opinion.  As well it should, as evidenced by recent data on student education outcomes as reported by Texas 2036: 52% of students are on grade level in reading 40% of students […]

Today the Commissioner of the National Center for Education Statistics released the math and reading results of 9-year-olds (4th graders) from the 2022 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP)–the first nationally representative report comparing student achievement from before the pandemic to now, and it was as predicted–an absolute disaster, reflecting unprecedented declines on the long […]

The Texas Education Agency (TEA) has recently released the 2022 student assessment results on the State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness (STAAR) and they are revealing in several ways.  Governor Greg Abbott was recently challenged by Politifact to validate his claim that the Texas high school graduation rate is at 90% overall, ranking the […]

Last week I took time to watch online the delivery of the Texas Education Agency’s 2021 Annual Report to the Texas State Board of Education by Texas Education Commissioner Mike Morath, and it was predictably revealing and shocking, pretty much as most observers expected, which is probably why it has been very lightly reported by […]