Topic: SBOE

‘Mexican American’ gets initial nod for course, but without the hyphen.

Publish Date: June 13, 2018

The State Board of Education took a preliminary vote today to change the name of the new Mexican-American history course to “Ethnic Studies: Mexican American Studies.” SBOE had initially assigned the name “Ethnic Studies: An Overview of Americans of Mexican Descent,” after one board member, David Bradley, said he found “hyphenated Americanism to be divisive." Mexican-American activists across the state...

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Tell the State Board of Education our schools are not for sale!

Publish Date: June 8, 2018

In the June 5 Hotline we covered Commissioner of Education Mike Morath's approval of three new charters and outlined how destructive these new charter chains would be for school districts and individual campuses. Now is your chance to fight back against this assault on our public schools by out-of-state charter chains funded by the Walton Foundation and other billionaires intent on privatizing...

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New charter-school applicants to be evaluated

Publish Date: April 13, 2018

The Texas Education Agency’s timeline for screening applicants to establish new charter school systems was announced at the close of today’s State Board of Education meeting. TEA staff will interview six applicants on May 21-22; SBOE members also may participate in the questioning. The commissioner of education then is expected to make his approval recommendations by May 31, subject to...

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Mexican-American studies course one step closer to approval

Publish Date: April 12, 2018

A long struggle to add a course in Mexican-American studies to the state curriculum is on the verge of success. As reported in the Texas Tribune: Texas advocates for Mexican-American studies classes won a bitter victory Wednesday, gaining approval to move forward with the class they wanted but losing the course title. The State Board of Education had been debating...

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A chance to remove the “politicized distortion of history” from Texas curriculum standards

Publish Date: February 28, 2018

Eight years ago the State Board of Education blundered badly in drafting curriculum standards for social studies, approving language that has led textbook writers for the Texas market to distort what schoolchildren here learn about history. SBOE members have a chance to correct the mistakes of 2010 as these curriculum standards come up for review later this year. In the...

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State Board of Education developing Long-Range Plan via community meetings, survey

Publish Date: January 3, 2018

The State Board of Education is developing a new Long-Range Plan for Public Education through an 18-member steering committee made up of board members, stakeholder group representatives, and individuals from three state agencies. (This is not to be confused with the 13-member commission on school finance created by the Legislature in the special session last summer—concerning which we’ll have a...

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School Funding Comes to a Vote in Texas House

Publish Date: April 19, 2017

--School Funding Comes to a Vote in Texas House --Senate Committee Puts Priority on More Money for Charters --State Board of Education Debates Science Standards School Funding Comes to a Vote:  Scheduled for state House floor consideration on Wednesday is HB 21, the bill by Rep. Dan Huberty (R-Houston) to revise school-finance formulas and increase school aid to districts. The...

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Upholding Standards for the Teaching Profession

Publish Date: April 11, 2017

On a busy day in state House and Senate education committees, we want to highlight one issue in particular raised by companion bills in both chambers. SB 1278 by Sen. Larry Taylor (R-Friendswood) and HB 2924 by Rep. Dwayne Bohac (R-Houston) reflect the agenda of private, for-profit educator-preparation programs calling for lower standards of entry into the teaching profession. Texas...

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