03.31.06
Posted in News at 2:44 am by Paloma Cruz
HCC trustees make plans to cover shortfall
College finds itself in need of $67 million more than what voters agreed to in 2003
– reported by the Houston Chronicle
Houston Community College leaders told voters less than three years ago that they could complete a dozen construction projects for $151 million.
Turns out, the leaders are short roughly $67 million.
So HCC’s governing board moved Wednesday to close the gap with a series of financial maneuvers intended to preserve the voter-approved building plan without raising taxes.
In a 7-2 vote, the trustees signed off on a wide-ranging strategy that includes imposing a technology fee on students and delaying the planned renovation to the central campus, a 91-year-old building listed in the National Historic Register.
The trustees also rescinded a planned property tax break. Homeowners won’t be getting the extra 10 percent homestead exemption trustees had previously decided to give.
[snip]
When voters approved the bond referendum in November 2003, college leaders promised to build or acquire seven new facilities, expand three and renovate two throughout the city, with the intention of adding 772,000 square feet to the college’s existing 2 million square feet.
A HCC study found at the time that the 53,000-student system averaged 66 square feet of space per full-time student, compared with the national urban norm of 110 square feet.
Before the election, University of Houston political scientist Richard Murray told trustees that voters would probably approve the measure, as long as the property tax rate wouldn’t increase more than 1.5 cents per $100 assessed valuation.
Ultimately, property owners in the college’s tax district agreed to pay an additional 1.57 cents per $100 assessed valuation for 25 years, or about $15.70 a year for a $100,000 house without homestead or other exemptions.
[snip]
The trustees intend to close the gap by redirecting almost $38 million earmarked for renovation and expansion projects at the central and northeast campuses and borrowing against money set aside to maintain aging buildings.
Rescinding the planned homestead exemption would provide as much as $4 million annually for salary increases and other operating costs, Walker said.
Also, the new technology fee of $3.95 per semester credit hour would help to pay for $39 million in equipment, including $15 million that was initially part of the bond plan.
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03.30.06
Posted in News at 2:29 am by Paloma Cruz
Deer Park High selects 4 more graduates for its Hall of Honor
One of the men has served as choir director at Sterling High in Baytown for 17 years
– reported by the Houston Chronicle
Four Deer Park High School graduates, including one now living in Hong Kong, are being inducted into the Felton Waggoner Hall of Honor this weekend.
This year’s inductees include an international businessman, an attorney who has tried a case before the U.S. Supreme Court, a man who has had businesses in Deer Park for 50 years and a choral director who has touched the lives of hundreds of students. The four inductees are Jeffery Fisher, class of 1989; Millard Johnson, class of 1976; Glen Tolar, class of 1954, and Tim Vaughn, class of 1975.
[snip]
The four will be honored during the 10th annual Hall of Honor banquet Saturday. The banquet serves as a fundraiser for the Deer Park Educational Foundation, which offers annual grants to the district’s teachers and other employees for the implementation of innovative instructional programs. This school year, the foundation presented $47,589 in grants to the district.
[snip]
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Posted in News at 2:18 am by Paloma Cruz
Project GRAD to trim 30 jobs as funds decline
The scholarship program for HISD students struggles to stay afloat
– reported by the Houston Chronicle
Dwindling federal and local funding will force Project GRAD Houston to lay off roughly 30 employees in the next two months — cutting the workforce of the nonprofit group that provides college scholarships to low-income students to about half of what it was a year ago, officials said.
Among those to step down will be Executive Director Roy Hughes, whose last day will be March 31. Other staff cuts are coming from the business and the elementary school divisions, officials said.
[snip]
Currently, 142,000 students at 70 HISD schools participate in the Project GRAD program that promises $4,000 scholarships to students who graduate with at least a 2.5 grade-point average. Those schools also use the nonprofit’s discipline, math, reading and parent engagement programs.
But the program has been called into question over the last year by leaders of the Houston Independent School District, who recently made plans to cut $1.9 million of the $3.2 million stipend that they provide Project GRAD this year.
[snip]
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03.29.06
Posted in News at 10:39 pm by Paloma Cruz
TSU names temporary replacement for president
– reported by KTRK ABC Channel 13
[snip]
Provost Dr. Bobby Wilson will fill the role on a temporary basis. Slade is under investigation for alleged misuse of school funds totaling more than $200,000.
TSU’s Wilson put in charge temporarily
– reported by the Houston Chronicle
Texas Southern University regents tapped longtime Provost Bobby Wilson to lead the historically black institution in the absence of President Priscilla Slade. The regents placed Slade on paid leave March 16 pending the outcome of an inquiry into her spending.
[snip]
TSU Selects Interim President
– reported by Click2Houston.com
[snip]
Priscilla Slade was placed on paid leave, pending the outcome of an investigation into the alleged spending of university money on her private home.
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Posted in News at 10:17 pm by Paloma Cruz
Houston-area students who participated in walk-outs and protests will have to do the time, or just leave:
Consequences await students who continue protests
– reported by KTRK ABC Channel 13
School districts across the Houston area are urging students to stay in class or else face serious consequences.
[snip]
Students march on despite disciplinary warnings
– reported by KHOU CBS Channel 11
[snip]
HISD superintendent Dr. Abe Saavedra on Tuesday said students who engaged in that activity Wednesday could be suspended for up to three days or removed from school. HISD students are only allowed three unexcused absences a semester, officials said.
A Katy ISD spokesperson said the Mayde Creek students were warned of disciplinary action before leaving, but they marched to the courthouse annex on Clay Road anyway.
The spokesperson said those students would receive five days of in-school suspension, and those who were seniors would not be allowed to go on the senior trip.
Alvin ISD considers the students truant, and they will receive in-school suspension or be required to attend Saturday classes.
[snip]
Hispanic students take to streets again
Protests draw critics, supporters — and efforts from schools to stop them
– reported by the Houston Chronicle
[snip]
hirley Brothers, spokeswoman for the Alvin school district, said about 100 students started marching from the high school about 7 a.m., a half-hour before school started.
They marched at least 2 miles north on Texas 35 and were demanding to meet with Alvin Mayor Andy Reyes.
In Baytown, about 50 students, some waving the green, white and red flag of Mexico, skipped class to march peacefully across the street from one the town’s two high schools, Robert E. Lee, whose 2,511 students are 49 percent Hispanic.
School administrators met briefly with the students in the school auditorium at 8 a.m. to discuss alternate ways of fighting the proposed changes, including writing letters to government officials and contacting Hispanic news organizations, said Terri Cook, a district spokeswoman.
[snip]
Many who participated in Tuesday’s activities face citations and detentions for cutting class. The Class C violation carries a fine of up to $500.
The move in Congress to make it a felony to be in the U.S. without proper documentation was included in a U.S. House immigration bill passed in December, but was rejected by the Senate Judiciary Committee on Monday.
Latino community leaders said they were amazed by the turnout.
[snip]
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Posted in News at 6:37 pm by Paloma Cruz
Strayhorn urges lawmakers to boost budget for teacher pay
– reported by the Houston Business Journal
Texas Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn released a new report Tuesday indicating that the state loses $13.8 billion annually by underpaying teachers.
She also called on Gov. Rick Perry and state lawmakers to fund a $4,000 across-the-board pay raise for all Texas teachers and fully restore state-funded health care supplements for all Texas educators in the upcoming special session of the Legislature.
[snip]
The report also notes that Texas ranks 33rd in the United States in teacher salaries and more than 37,000 teachers in Texas are leaving the profession each year for better paying jobs.
She adds that students in classrooms with inexperienced or poorly prepared teachers are at greater risk of flunking and dropping out of school.
[snip]
Strayhorn’s report reveals that high school drop-outs in Texas chew up some $11.8 billion in social services, incarceration and welfare expenses. By adding in the cost of teacher training and recruitment and other expenses, that price tag jumps to $13.8 billion, the report states.
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Posted in News at 1:32 pm by Paloma Cruz
A symbolic ‘perfect match’
Yellowstone Academy, which is aimed at inner-city students, will buy historic school
– reported by the Houston Chronicle
The Houston Independent School District will sell its historic Douglass Elementary School campus to the Yellowstone Academy — a 4-year-old private school designed to put inner-city children on the same footing as their counterparts in the suburbs.
Yellowstone Academy’s $1.9 million bid for the property put it atop a list of potential buyers that included the KIPP Academy, the charter school group that’s using the Trulley Street site for a temporary school for students displaced by Hurricane Katrina. HISD shut down the public school last year because of declining enrollment.
[snip]
At Yellowstone, a Christian school that opened in August 2002 at a church in the Third Ward, the majority of families pays less than $25 a month — meaning tuition accounts for less than 1 percent of the school’s $1.7 million annual budget.
Tuition rates are calculated based on each family’s income, expenses and even life-style choices. The average Yellowstone student comes from a family with an annual income of $9,600 a year. More than half receive public assistance and nearly 80 percent are from single-parent families, according to school statistics.
Nearly all children are black. Some of the families live in temporary shelters and a few of the children are in Child Protective Services custody.
[snip]
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Posted in News at 7:04 am by Paloma Cruz
HISD superintendent’s statement on walkouts
– reported by the Houston Chronicle
[snip]
All the students who participated in today’s walkouts will be disciplined. The parents of each student who participated will be contacted and informed of the student’s actions. Each student action associated with today’s events will be reviewed by school officials, and students may, at the discretion of the principal, be placed in detention or in-school suspension, and may also be subject to other sanctions.
If these demonstrations continue on Wednesday or another time in the future, the consequence for students who violate the standards of conduct will be more severe. A repeat of today’s demonstrations could cause students to be suspended for up to three days, or be removed.
[snip]
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Posted in News at 7:01 am by Paloma Cruz
Houston area students protest immigration reform proposal
– reported by the Houston Chronicle
About 150 students from an Aldine school staged a walkout this morning, hiking several miles to protest a potential congressional crackdown on illegal immigration.
After walking some eight miles from Eisenhower High School, 7922 Antoine, to the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services office at 126 Northpoint Drive, the group stood outside holding signs and a Mexican flag for about two hours.
By 2 p.m. the students had dispersed but few if any appeared to have boarded the school buses sent to retrieve them.
[snip]
Other students said they walked past Aldine High School which was locked down so others could not leave.
[snip]
Houston-area students march to City Hall
– reported by the Houston Chronicle
Hundreds of students from Houston-area schools skipped class this morning to march in the rain to City Hall and participate in other local rallies to protest tighter restrictions on immigration.
Hector Arguelles, 18, said he and about 100 other students from Jeff Davis High School felt inspired to walk out today after seeing teens protest nationally Monday.
He prepared and distributed a flier to help his classmates understand the main points of proposed federal legislation that aims to make it a crime - rather than a civil violation - to live in the United States without proper documentation. The legislation would also put penalties on employers who hire immigrants and build fences along parts of the U.S.-Mexico border.
[snip]
At least a dozen school buses were parked along McKinney. The buses were sent by the Houston Independent School District to drive students back to Austin, Davis and Sam Houston high schools. By 1 p.m., school officials announced that the students were back on their campuses.
[snip]
Students protest proposed tighter rules
Walkouts that were organized over the Internet held at Eisenhower and other schools
– reported by the Houston Chronicle
[snip]
About 150 students, most of them Hispanic, left Eisenhower around 9 a.m. and walked nine miles to an immigration office, where they stood outside holding signs and a Mexican flag for nearly two hours.
By 2 p.m. the students had dispersed at the urging of about a dozen police officers, but none boarded the four school buses sent to retrieve them.
Students at several other schools in Houston also walked out in opposition to proposed federal legislation that would impose new penalties on employers who hire illegal immigrants, build fences along parts of the U.S.-Mexico border, punish those who assist illegal immigrants, and make it a crime — rather than a civil violation — to be in the United States without proper documentation.
The marches were organized primarily over the Internet after several massive protests took place last week around the country, including one in Houston on Saturday that drew 6,000 marchers.
[snip]
More headlines:
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Posted in Resources at 6:15 am by Paloma Cruz
2006-2007 school calendar now official
Key dates on the 2006-2007 school calendar are as follows:
First day of school for students - August 10 (Ninth graders will begin one day earlier on August 9)
First day for teachers - August 3
Last day for students - May 24, 2007
Last day for teachers - May 25, 2007
Holidays
Labor Day - Sept. 4
Thanksgiving - Nov. 20-24
Winter Break - Dec. 18-Jan.3, 2007 (Employees will return Jan. 2, 2007)
Martin Luther King Day - Jan. 15, 2007
Spring Break - March 12-16, 2007
Easter - April 6 and 9, 2007
Need the 2005-2006 calendar? It’s available, as a PDF.
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