Little known Houstonian sticking it to Bush and TEA

[ChicanoPwr]

Abe Saavedra HISD's first Hispanic superintendent made his first "State of the Schools" addresss on Tuesday, Feb 15, 2005.

Since taking over as superintendent on December 9, Dr. Saavedra has already made the needed reforms at HISD, he has made a promise including reduce testing, slash administrative costs, and close under-enrolled schools, in addition to opening a new school for immigrant students and creating a new investigative office. The move to reduce testing is a bold move for any school disctrict to make considering we are in a high stake testing era started by then Gov. BuShit. This move also will go against Texas' Education Agency.

His plans for this year will include:
- Turning low-performing schools over to new leadership
- Zero tolerance on test cheating
- Reduction in testing needed
- Getting more four-year-olds into school
- More budget cuts coming

Address calls for a reduction in testing, increased focus on teaching and learning
"The emphasis should be on what is taught and how well it is taught and not so much on test scores . . . School districts will always be measured by standardized test results, and they should be," Dr. Saavedra said. "But I think—frankly—we are overdoing the testing at HISD. We have found that some students spend up to 22 days each year on standardized testing. That's a whole month of the school year. That's time spent away from instruction and from meaningful interaction between teachers and students. There needs to be a balance."

What he will and what he has done
In outlining major goals for 2005, Dr. Saavedra said Houston has a "tremendous need" for more public prekindergarten classes, and he announced HISD will redirect federal Title I funding to offer more full-day prekindergarten programs. He also said HISD will allow the families of students who don't qualify under the federal program but who need prekindergarten services anyway to enroll their children in prekindergarten.

"Four-year-olds should be in school learning during those vitally important early years; and yet, many of our families cannot afford to send their children to private prekindergarten centers," Dr. Saavedra said. "We consider our early childhood education initiatives to be of significant importance. When a four-year-old has instruction and social interaction from the beginning, there is a better chance that good learning habits and social behavior will be maintained throughout his or her life."

Dr. Saavedra told community leaders that the entire city must "do more to reach disengaged or impoverished young people who just don't see education as a priority; we must do more to compete with the distractions and negative peer pressure that students face daily; we must do more for teachers to have the training and means to teach effectively; we must do more with the decreasing education dollars to address the needs of all students. We—all of us—HISD, parents, and the community—must do more together."

The school district drew nationwide attention on August 28, 2004, when 500 community volunteers and school officials fanned out throughout the city and visited dropouts' homes to persuade them to come back to school. The successful Reach Out to Dropouts campaign followed the first-ever citywide dropout-prevention summit, part of HISD's ongoing "expectation: GRADUATION" program.

Invigorated by the success of the Reach Out to Dropouts campaign, HISD hired 10 dropout-prevention specialists to work to get more dropouts back in school and keep them there. Dr. Saavedra announced Tuesday that the dropout-prevention specialists "last month alone recovered 67 students" who had dropped out of school.

On January 10, HISD opened a Newcomers Charter School to help keep immigrant students in school until they graduate. Dr. Saavedra said the school already has enrolled more than 125 students and has more than 300 on a waiting list. During the State of the Schools address, he introduced Libertad Bazán, a student from Mexico who was one of the first to enroll in the Newcomers School.

Dr. Saavedra is man who can turn around the 7th largest school district around. He is willing to stand-up to B* and his new Sec of Education Faith-Base lap-dog Margaret Spellings. According to AZCentral http://www.azcentral.com/families/education/articles/1116bush-spelling-ON.html

Spellings, is a friend who long ago won his trust, helped managed his school agenda in Texas. "She understands what he thinks. They're very, very close," said Sandy Kress, a lawyer who worked at the White House for Spellings when he was Bush's senior education adviser. Spellings worked for six years as Bush's education adviser in Texas, pushing policies on early reading and student accountability. They became the model for the federal law, No Child Left Behind, that Spellings helped put together from the White House after Bush's election in 2000.

What kind of mess does Dr. Saavedra have to clean-up
Following the class of 2004 for Austin HS in Houston's East Side
Freshman year 2000-01 = 1,160
Sophomore yr 2001-02 = 257 (50% droped-out)
Junior year 2002-03 = 446
Senior year 2003-04 = 265

[GetTheRightVote]

1. Good luck, you have great goals, I hope they make it to them

:kick:

[CitySky]

2. thanks for the report

Question re dropout rates - I think you mistyped the "Sophomore" stat - it's smaller than the Junior. Do you still have the number?

One sad note about HS dropout rates in Houston - they don't reflect kids who drop out BEFORE high school, during or after 8th grade. I understand that this a big but often ignored problem particularly in the Hispanic community. For the high school, it's actually "better" for their numbers if the kid drops out in 8th. sad sad sad!

How can communtiy members become volunteers? I assume most are parents, but I'm not a parent and I still care about kids (former teacher); maybe there are others on DU in the same boat.

[ChicanoPwr]

3. I wish I did mistype

When I saw I really thought it was a mistake too. It is hard to figure out how the number doubled. The only reason I chose that school that is the local HS work with, I like to see what other HS also have a dip and a rise and dip again. This really needs to be investigated, because it is very odd pattern

[merci_me]

4. Could the junior rate be higher

because they need to be 16 to drop out?

Assuming the kids are on track for their age group, by their junior year all of them should have hit the age of 16.

Also, once they finish the sophomore year, if they passed and just don't even show up for their junior year, the drop would be counted as a junior.

My son is the principal of a charter school that only takes drop-outs age 16-23. They work part-time or even full-time and go to school 4 hours a day and it's set around their work schedule. They end up with a full high school diploma, not a GED. His goal is to mainstream as many as possible, of the younger ones back into the public school system.

At one time, he taught at a school that had students on a maximum of 6 months, coming from drug rehab and/or with emotional/discipline issues. Again the goal was to mainstream them back. But that was an elementary through high school situation. Now a good number of his students are too old or gainfully employed, so the charter school becomes their only option to get a real diploma.

Between these gigs, he taught at a Jesuit boys high school where the parents were putting out $10K per student. He said anyone could teach those kids. Between the authority of the Jesuits and the demand of the parents who were paying and the education the kids had ever since kindergarten, it was a win-win.

Now, he seems happiest with this challenge.

Mary