This is a very complicated issue.
Two decades ago, children crowded the halls of Houston ISD’s Attucks and Cullen middle schools, historic campuses located two miles apart on the city’s south side.
Since then, hundreds of families have fled the area or moved their children to charter schools, leaving Attucks and Cullen half-empty with just 450 and 300 students, respectively. The enrollment losses have made the neighboring schools prime candidates for consolidation, a painful cost-saving measure that involves closing or combining campuses.
But after years of talks about shrinking HISD’s number of schools, a prospect floated by recent HISD superintendents and a state-led outside review team, the district’s new leaders are reversing course for now. Rather than closing either school, HISD Superintendent Mike Miles’ administration is proposing $40 million in upgrades for the two campuses as part of a $4.4 billion bond proposal that voters could consider in November.
The upgrades are part of Miles’ ambitious — but potentially wasteful — plan to invest millions of dollars in small and underutilized schools, with the goal of luring families back to once-proud campuses.
[…]
In an interview, Miles said he believes the upgrades, combined with his overhaul of the district, will help reverse enrollment declines that have hurt the district’s finances and the image of some campuses. HISD’s enrollment has fallen from 216,100 to 184,100 over the past seven years, largely due to fewer families residing in the district and the rapid expansion of charter schools.
Miles, who was appointed to lead the HISD in June 2023 as part of state sanctions against the district, said he is being “very careful” not to devote money to schools that would later be closed. The investments in low-enrollment and low-use schools address important health and safety issues, such as problems with air systems and water quality.
“We just haven’t done right by those schools over many, many years,” Miles said. “And so we’re going to blame them, close their schools, because we didn’t help them become a great school, (and) draw back the kids that they’re losing?”
Yet Miles’ plan risks throwing money at a problem he can’t definitively fix. There’s no guarantee that the upgrades will bring families back to HISD, particularly given the unpopularity of many of the changes he’s making to the district. If HISD continues to bleed students, the district could be left with dozens of upgraded but still half-empty buildings.
By keeping open low-enrollment schools, HISD also runs higher operating costs, taking money away from things like teacher salaries. The Texas Legislative Budget Board estimated in the late 2010s that HISD could save tens of millions of dollars each year if it closed dozens of low-enrollment schools.
The financial realities of running low-enrollment schools prompted HISD’s last two superintendents, Grenita Lathan and Millard House II, to raise the possibility of school closures, though district leaders ultimately danced around the issue. Upon his arrival last year, Miles also said he planned to study the issue and propose a list of schools that “need to be closed to provide a better education for the student and also to be more fiscally sound.”
See here and here for some background, and read the rest of the story, which includes a list of underutilized campuses that would get bond money. I’m glad to see some thought being given to addressing the enrollment decline, but only so much of that is in HISD’s control, and let’s be clear that Mike Miles is about the worst possible advocate for addressing this decline one can imagine.
This is a legitimately tough issue to talk about, and several of Miles’ predecessors have gotten their fingers burned trying to grasp it. On the one hand, there is a lot of money to be saved by consolidating schools that have way more capacity than students. At a time like this, that is especially important, but even in better times it could have meant spending more money on a per student basis. On the other hand, neighborhoods suffer when their schools are closed, students have to travel farther to get to their schools, a piece of history is lost, and people just flat don’t like it when this happens. The constituencies that oppose closing any given school are loud and organized, which makes it such a tough thing to do politically.
One could argue that an unaccountable Superintendent who has an unelected Board that doesn’t really oversee him is uniquely positioned to impose these unpopular decisions on the district. One could also suggest that such a Superintendent would have done well to build up trust within the community before putting forth that kind of proposal, instead of spending an entire year becoming the most hated man in town. Seeing Miles use bond money for campuses that had previously been on “could be closed” lists as a way of drumming up support for his bond proposal, especially after he had previously talked about putting together a closure list, is quite the irony.
I keep reading about how scores have improved; I don’t believe it. They have every reason to be deceitful. There are lies, and there are statistics. They control all the stats, and Republicans lie; they lie all the time.
One way to improve scores is to ensure students who can lower their test scores do not take the exam. How many students took the exam compared to previous years? There are other ways to do it, or one can just lie about the numbers.
There are demographic reasons to think that the enrollment declines are not going to reverse in the near term. We are in a period when the school age population (nationally) is declining. This is part of the explanation why a number of small colleges are shutting down – there just aren’t enough potential students to keep everyone viable.
If the voters/tax payers of HISD want to pay the premium to keep all of these underutilized public schools in operation, they have a legal right to do so. But, we should not kid ourselves that a new coat of paint is going to bring a flood of students back in.
If Miles succeeds in improving academic results in HISD, some students may return. But, “Meme” is right that there are ways to “game” the system that only create an appearance of improvement and HISD has already lost a great deal of credibility as a district.
In addition to the STAAR results, we should be looking at college & career readiness results. At HCC, the incoming students (all of whom have passed the STAAR exit exams) show 70-80% deficiencies (mostly in math). If those students were really college ready, there would not be such a huge deficiency rate.
I an a teacher at Worthing HS a NES campus while im not gung-ho about all of Miles’ implementations, results are results and no they were not faked as someone suggest. We suffered this year with all these new changes and while like I said i wasnt for it all but i did see the impact it had on students for sure. Miles gets tons of flack but ive come to realize he isnt beholden to taxpayers and city leadership he answers to MORRATH only! And its either turn HISD around which this years STARR scores do prove, or the districts old guard and community can be combative and not receptive and the district will go the way of New Orleans Public Schools District.
And to @meme that whole notion that special needs students do not take STARR or EOY Content Exams is absolutely false, They take each and every test regular students take and their progress is also tracked and recoreded and placed in school totals. They do recieve accommodations while they test but if they are in 9th grade special ed or not they will take a Math and Reading STARR this isnt an episode of King of The Hill this is real life.
AT III: The observation of one person does not make a truth.
So you create a lie to prove I am wrong; I did not mention special needs students.
You make me wonder if you are an English teacher.
AT III – from the Chronicle
At Wheatley, for example, state data shows that, in English I and II, the share of students meeting or exceeding state standards rose between 2023 and 2024. But when you look at absolute numbers, fewer students actually hit that mark, with fewer students taking the test at the campus, which has long struggled with declining enrollment.
Im a special needs instructor and you implied that students are exempt from STARR when no one at this entire campus was exempt from taking it. and this is a campus of over 800. No I do not teach english as that isnt my strong suit but the assumption you made when im sure you dont even work in education is false. The district doesnt even touch scores the exams are sent to the state and they send them back to the district thats how its been at least past 20 years since TAKS. You just have your feelings about the district and you’re entitled to that, but youre wrong simple and plain. The scores are readily available for you to see yourself my love! And Wheatley is a chronically depopulating campus. FYI wheatley was the largest black high school in the US in its hayday and if you knew anything youd know hisd hemorrhages almost 3-5k students yearly so every campus will have these same results outside of Lamar, Bellaire, Westside, Waltrip and Westbury. Thanks but i work here so i think im a little more qualified than you saying im wrong. And i grew up and attended the district my entire life.
and it amazes me that you point to Wheatley and assume they had less students take the test when you yourself say they have struggled with declining enrollment. There’s your less students right there obviously. But you rather try and belittle me talking about i’m not an English teacher because of how i type on an unimportant online forum.
Again, you fail to understand. Fewer students are taking the test. There are ways to discourage students from showing up to take the exam.
The Chronicle pointed to Wheatley. The gist is that while the percentage was higher, the number taking it was fewer.
But as to Special needs children, there are ways around that if people are creative. Besides special needs, children can go to school up to age 21. My son, who is autistic, was promoted every year, and he could not pass a test. When he got to 12th grade, they wanted to graduate him, but I told them no. He graduated at age 22.
Adoile, you represent teachers, and your grammar affects how people view teachers.
I taught at HISD for twenty years. I was not impressed with many teachers. Early on, we teachers were required to pass some tests. So many teachers failed basic math tests that HISD gave up on them.
Like polls, STARR tests can be gamed and rigged.
If it comes out of a MAGA’s mouth, it is probably a lie. “I can save you money.”