The Chron takes a look at the current state of historic Wheatley High School.
State Rep. Harold Dutton attended Wheatley High School. So did his mom, his brothers and sisters and "everyone I ever cared about or respected."The Houston Democrat and Kashmere Gardens resident, however, couldn't convince even one of his seven children to attend the historic Fifth Ward campus.
Over the past 15 years, his children broke the family tradition by graduating from Yates, Lamar, DeBakey and Booker T. Washington high schools.
"I tried to get my kids to go to Wheatley, but my kids wouldn't do it," Dutton said. "One of my sons said, 'Daddy, the Wheatley today is not the Wheatley you went to.' "
Not even a $35 million rebuild of the campus -- financed by the Houston school district's 2002 bond program -- has convinced students that they should attend their neighborhood campus. Nearly half of the 2,134 teens zoned to attend Wheatley this year transferred to other schools, including Furr, Davis, Reagan and Barbara Jordan high schools, according to Houston Independent School District data.
It's cases like Wheatley that fuel opposition in some neighborhoods to HISD's $805 million bond referendum on the Nov. 6 ballot. Years of neglect, black community leaders argue, have left their schools academically inferior, putting a bull's-eye for closure on some of their most cherished schools and making residents increasingly distrustful of HISD's motives.
If HISD made an effort to hire better educators and create stronger academic programs, children would stay at their neighborhood schools and the campuses would thrive, they say.
"New buildings and new facilities alone will not address the issues," said Rep. Sylvester Turner, D-Houston, one of the bond's loudest critics. "You have to rebuild the instructional programming or parents are still going to walk."
In other HISD news, they picked up the endorsement of the Harris County Tejano Democrats over the weekend:
In August 2007, the Houston Independent School District (HISD) Board of Trustees voted to place an $805 million bond proposal on the Tuesday, November 6th General Election ballot for voter approval. Today the Harris County Tejano Democrats (HCTD) announced that the organization unanimously voted to support HISD's bond proposal. The organization feels that Superintendent Abelardo Saavedra and the HISD board failed to properly engage the community in the decision-making process with regard to its plans for neighborhood schools. However, Harris County Tejano Democrats understand the need to build 24 new schools and make badly needed renovations, repairs and extensions to 138 schools in all areas of the district. As part of the bond proposal, every campus will receive security upgrades and every secondary school will receive new science labs. For these reasons, the Harris County Tejano Democrats endorse the $805 million bond proposal with the confidence that Dr. Saavedra and HISD will work with all communities to remedy any ongoing concerns as they relate to the bond proposal.