Dallas / Fort Worth Local News

AUSTIN (AP) ― The interim chief of the Texas Education Agency on Wednesday promised swift and serious reforms at four schools that have failed to meet state standards for four or five straight years but said none of the campuses would be closed.

About 300 of the state's 8,061 campuses were deemed academically unacceptable, the state's lowest rating, mostly due to low math and science standardized test scores, acting Commissioner of Education Robert Scott said.

Three campuses -- Oak Village Middle School in the North Forest school district in Houston, G.L. Wiley Middle School in Waco and Johnston High School in Austin -- got the lowest rating for the fourth straight year. Sam Houston High School in the Houston Independent School District has been unacceptable for five consecutive years.

State law calls for a series of increasingly serious sanctions for schools and districts that receive unacceptable ratings. Staff shakeups must occur after three years of low scores, and the state may close a school after four years.

But TEA officials agreed to give all four campuses more time to pull up their scores since abruptly closing them would be hard on the districts and their students.

"If for some reason those districts choose not to act or ... if we get in terms of Band-Aids rather than whole system change we will look at the most severe sanctions available to us," Scott said.

Ratings are typically based on student performance on the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills, or TAKS, and a standardized test for special education students along with dropout and completion rates.

Because the state is phasing in tougher dropout standards, districts and campuses were not given lower ratings if they were acceptable in every area but that one. They will, however, have to work to improve those rates this school year.

About half of the state's campuses, educating about 2.7 million children, were rated academically acceptable. To earn that rating, 65 percent of students must pass the TAKS in English/language arts, writing and social studies, 45 percent must pass in math and 40 percent must pass in science.

Twenty-nine percent of schools, or 2,345 campuses, met a more rigorous standard and were rated recognized. About 8 percent of campuses, or 637 schools, were deemed exemplary with at least 90 percent of their students passing each subject of the TAKS.

In the Dallas school district, one out of ten campuses received the state's lowest academic rating.

According to test scores, two dozen schools in the district are academically unacceptable. Fifteen schools received the state's highest rating.

"Overall, we're acceptable. But to us, there's still much more work to be done," said Jon Dahlander, a spokesperson for the district. "Our goal is to improve all the schools so none of them are low performing and all of them are exemplary. Are we going to get that overnight? No. But we're trying."

The number of unacceptable campuses increased from 286 to 301 this year, and Scott said tougher math and science standards were to blame. Last year, only 40 percent of students had to pass the TAKS math section and 35 percent had to pass science.

Scott said the state is working to boost those scores by adopting new math textbooks and launching science, technology, engineering and mathematics centers to develop new ways of teaching the subject.

Statewide, 83 percent of students passed the TAKS English/language arts, writing and social studies sections, 64 percent passed the math section and 56 percent passed the science section.

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