Terri Majors and Cynthia Blackman ran campaigns saying they wanted to create a new working majority on the school board to pursue a series of reforms including expanded accountability to Alton Frailey and his team of administrators.

The voters have determined otherwise which is their absolute, total, and unquestioned right and authority to do so.

Despite the the fact that Katy I.S.D.’s election was hampered by yet to be disclosed problems that delayed reporting results until close to midnight on election night, the results that gave Michalsky and Griffin their victories were by a clear and convincing majority.

The results leave no reasonable room to question what the will of the majority is although the votes also show that Blackman and Terry attracted the votes of thousands of citizens who are concerned.

However, overall the community is well served by the fact that the election was not a genuine squeaker such that shadows would arise over the results because of the delayed reporting of results.

These results clearly reflect the will of the majority as represented in our free society by those who actually vote.  Voters matter. Voters have decided.

Make no mistake.  This was as aggressive a campaign that has been waged in this community in almost 30 years.  Both sides had their say and one side won a clear victory.

There are no shadows on the results.

George Scott

Apparently, the rumors that swirled in the background of this year’s school board election from almost the beginning are true.  Those rumors have revolved around the notion that some boosters of Katy Tiger football have chosen their favorites in the race because they believe they’ll get better treatment in future rezoning matters.

It doesn’t make any sense whatsoever.  That’s the reason that I avoided the subject for so long.

But, when Tiger Icon Coach Mike Johnston who led the revival of the Katy Tiger football program publicly endorsed the very two candidates that were the subject of the rumors, then ears tend to perk up.

When contribution reports show a major contribution from one of the Tigers’ all-time great players who went on to a NFL professional career pop up, then rumors begin the process of morphing to perceived reality.

So, if this is the fourth quarter of the school board race (and it is), then it is clear that two people highly associated with the Katy Tiger football program have put their names and money on two candidates they apparently believe will be kind to the Katy Tigers.

Katy Tiger football versus Katy Tiger college graduation rates.

Wow. That’s a really tough choice - especially for all those folks in Cinco Ranch, Seven Lakes, Morton Ranch, Mayde Creek, and Taylor.

Of course, what parents from all of these other schools will understand, this is not just about football.  It’s about the full range of co-curricular and extra-curricular programs.  All of these schools and all of these kids deserved to be treated fairly in everything the district does.

Anyway, it does now appear that some of the more desperate Katy Tiger football boosters are in search of their first school board championship.  What are the rest of us saying:  where’s that “oh-so-effective prevent defense” against Pearland when the community really needs it?  (Those who saw the football game understand that dig because that was a state championship that slipped away for reasons that had nothing to do with school board races.)

As far as I can tell, Cynthia Blackman and Terri Majors will be even handed in all matters coming before the board.

As the father of three graduates of Katy High School let me say two things:

1. I really have enjoyed Katy Tiger football for well over two decades.
2. I want those Katy Tiger college graduation rates to improve more than I want another state football championship for them.

Actually, I think most people in the City of Katy have a similar outlook as mine and will reject this cynical, funny if it were not tragic ploy.

While he is the focal point point because of his intellectually idiotic decision to establish his administration as the “Center of Truth” on matters of public education…

While he is the focal point because he once told teachers gathered in one of his self-righteous and pompous command performances that one of the biggest concerns of high school students was the growing cynicism and failure to come together on public education issues by their parents…

While he is the focal point because of  his ‘keystone cop’ handling of the financial turmoil of last year’s budget matters involving the reduction in force of classroom teachers…

While he is the focal point because he is one of if not the most philosophically liberal superintendents in the modern history of this school district in a community that primarily espouses its conservatism… Saturday’s election is not a referendum on Alton Frailey.

It is a referendum on what the parents and voters of Katy I.S.D. believe their proper role is in public education in general and Katy I.S.D. in particular.

On one side of that debate is Cynthia Blackman and Terri Majors who want to join current minority members Dr. Bill Proctor and Terry Huckaby in creating a new working majority.

On the other side of that debate is a string of candidates who in one form or another will preserve the acquiescent surrender of the school board’s righteous authority to be meaningful participants in major policies and programs that Katy I.S.D. initiates.

The focal point, thus, is the contract of the superintendent of schools and the standards of accountability that are in that contract.

Currently, and in recent years, Katy I.S.D. School Boards have demonstrated the courage of marshmallows in the soft, squishy,and ambiguous non-standards of genuine accountability they have imposed upon successive superintendents in Katy I.S.D.

The job of superintendent in Katy I.S.D. (most school districts in Texas for that matter) has become one of a de facto management dictator. Superintendents launch programs and never really have to justify whether those programs work in any meaningful empirical way.

School boards including Katy’s have mastered the technique of  ’success by assertion.’ 

The contractual power of the superintendent even lets the person holding that job turn that contract against the school board if it begins to even show signs of  independence.

The structure of state government and the state’s education bureaucracy including the Texas Association of School Boards and the Texas Association of School Administrators all play a role in suppressing school boards’ rightful role in governance.

It does not have to be this way.  Parents and voters can change this institution destroying process of governance by electing school board members who are dedicated to restoring the balance of power between the those that govern and those who are governed.

Fortunately, Saturday’s election is one of those that comes down to the brass knuckles of reality.

Cynthia Blackman and Terri Majors want to put the people of Katy back in charge of their school district.  The other candidates have not demonstrated that they even have a clue or any basic understanding of this issue.

Cynthia Blackman and Terri Majors have run on substantive issues.  The others have run on what former President Richard Nixon called ‘bumper sticker’ platitudes.

There are deep and abiding problems in public education, and Katy I.S.D. is not immune from those problems.

Come Saturday, Proctor and Huckaby will be joined by Blackman and Majors and there will at least be a chance the forces of reform will have a chance to protect the public’s financial interest and restore dignity to the classroom teachers of Katy I.S.D. who have been stripped of so much of theirs.

Come Saturday, reform begins or reform stops dead in its tracks.

Fresh off reporting the good, the somewhat good, and the very ugly results of the 6-year college graduation rates for the high schools of Katy I.S.D., I sought and received the latest round of results on the 2011-12 Preliminary Scholastic Aptitude Test (PSAT).

In many valuable ways, the PSAT tests administered to juniors give parents and the public the most effective insight into the overall status of academic preparation for any given high school. That’s because a higher percentage of juniors often taken the PSAT test than senior graduates take the actual college entrance SAT or ACT tests their next year.

Plus, there is a strong and established correlation between the  PSAT at the junior level and the SAT.

There are no surprises to me especially since I have been looking at this data for many years.  In reading and math, there are about 34% of the juniors at Cinco Ranch, Taylor, and Seven Lakes High Schools on a general pace to meet or exceed the Texas Education Agency’s criterion score of 1110 (out of 1600) on the future SAT. About 20% of the juniors at Katy High School are on that pace while just under 10% at Mayde Creek and Morton Ranch are on that pace.

Roughly 25% of the juniors at Cinco Ranch, Taylor, and Seven Lakes are on a pace to score below 900 on the future SAT. Some 42% of the juniors at Katy High School are on that pace while about 59% at Mayde Creek and Morton Ranch are.  Of course, many of the low performing juniors will not even take the SAT test.

These are figures that should dominate the dicussion of a school board race.  These are figures that should be of grave concern to parents.  Yet, Katy I.S.D. voters often find themselves distracted in the final week of a school board campaign.

WOLFE ELEMENTARY AND EXTRACURRICULAR ACTIVITIES

For those of us who have been around for quite some time, the defenders of the status quo always had the phony-baloney tactic of alleging if ‘outsiders’ were put on the school board, the closing of tiny Wolfe Elementary School was imminent.  Never true, but the tactic worked.

Now, with a new Wolfe Elementary School fully operational, the imminent danger to the extracurricular programs of the district has suddenly reared its head.  Let’s call this foolishness Wolfe II in dishonor of the tactic.  I think about those PSAT scores and all of a sudden the Wolfe II distraction becomes very, very, very important doesn’t it?

KATY TIGER FOOTBALL ICON COACH MIKE JOHNSTON

I like Mike Johnston.  I really do.  I have known and watched him since I moved to town in 1983.  I knew him when his football teams were a wreck as he began the rebuilding process that led the campus to multi state football championships.

There have been rumors from the very beginning of the campaign that the Katy Tiger football machine had embraced two of the candidates who are running with the full blessing of the establishment in order to protect Katy Tiger football in future rezoning matters.  I never paid much attention to it and, until now, never wrote anything about it.

I am not going to belabor this, but I wonder if the picture of Katy Tiger football icon Coach Mike Johnston with his two smiling candidates goes over well in the Cinco Ranch and Seven Lakes zones.  I wonder if a picture of Katy Tiger football icon Coach Mike Johnston with his candidates plays well among the Cougars and the Spartans? Are the rumors right?

STANLEY THOMPSON AND POLITICAL BUMPER STICKERS

I remember when public education accountability and reform really meant something to former Katy I.S.D. School Board member Stanley Thompson.  That is when, many years ago, I helped organize his campaign to earn a seat on the school board because the district had a superintendent who Thompson and many others thought insufficient to the job.

I think about the Stanley I know today who has apparently endorsed two candidates who have their bumper sticker platitudes down well and the election of whom will allow a school board’s refusal to hold its administration accountable to continue unabated.

I really respected the Stanley I knew and feel sad for the Stanley I now see.

TAXPAYERS, PARENTS, STUDENTS, & CLASSROOM TEACHERS

This election should be about what is in the best interest of the taxpayers, parents, students, and classroom teachers of Katy I.S.D.

In reality, this election is a referendum on the Katy I.S.D. School Board’s continuing decision manifested over many years and many school boards to surrender its authority to hold its administrators fully accountable.

The sides are chosen.  A new working majority can restore authority to the school board.

The sides are chosen.  The public can validate the status quo.

That’s what elections are about - oh and Wolfe Elementary and extracurricular activities.

How about them college graduation rates and those PSAT scores?

While the THECB does yet report graduation rates for Seven Lakes High School and Morton Ranch High School, Seven Lakes will almost certainly rank in the same range as Taylor and Cinco Ranch when the THECB updates its reports to include more recent years.  Morton Ranch will almost certainly be closer to the ranges previously reported for Mayde Creek High School.

The tables included in this report come from information provided by the THECB that documents the track record of three successive graduation classes between the 2002 and 2004 academic years at Cinco Ranch and Taylor.

It is important to note that these figures do NOT include graduates from those high schools that may have graduated from universities or colleges outside Texas.

Of the 1,712 Taylor graduates tracked, a total of 46.6% earned a baccalaureate degree within six years of high school graduation. The report also shows that only about 3.3% earned an associate degree at a community college and fewer than 1% earned a certificate as defined by the THECB reporting standards.

At Cinco Ranch, 44.2% earned a baccalaureate degree within six years from a Texas higher education institution while the same pictured emerged for associate degrees and certificates as at Taylor.

The question that arises from this report is the same that arose from the earlier reports on Katy High School and Mayde Creek High school: how many of the graduates attended and received degrees from out of state institutions? For Katy and Mayde Creek, analysis is simpler.

However, the numbers on out of state graduates is not collected by the THECB, thus there is no known source that can provide a precise answer.  However, there are some known facts that can be used to draw some common sense conclusions.  However, first, we’ll continue to look at the tables as reported, and deal with the out of state issue later.

The text of the column continues after the tables below.

Did Not Enroll in Texas Category:

This is the category of the THECB report from which the majority of the out of state graduates would be noted and tallied, if possible.  These are students who graduated from high school in the spring and DID NOT enroll immediately in a college or university in Texas in the following fall.

As the report notes only a small fraction of this category of students earned either a baccalaureate or associate degree from a community college and even fewer students earn a certificate from a community college.

Of the 461 graduates (26.6% of the graduating class) of Taylor in the reporting period, 26 (5.6%)eventually earned a baccalaureate degree in Texas and only a total of six earned either an associate degree or certificate.

Of the 519 graduates (30.3% of the graduating class) of Cinco Ranch, 30 (5.8%) earned a baccalaureate degree while only 5 earned either an associate degree or certificate.

Enrolled In 2-Year College

This is the category of students who graduated from high school in the spring and enrolled in the following fall in a two-year college in Texas.

At both Cinco Ranch and Taylor, some 25% of these students transferred to a four-year university and earned a baccalaureate degree. Some 11% of the these students at Taylor earned an associate degree an some 9% of these students at Cinco Ranch did within the industry standard 6-year reporting timeline.

Roughly 2% at each campus among these students earned a certificate.

Summarized, of the 362 graduates from Taylor in this group, about 37% earned either a baccalaureate degree, associate degree, or certificate meaning that 63% did not.

Summarized, of the 377 graduates from Cinco Ranch, about 36% earned either a baccalaureate degree, associate degree, or certificate meaning that about 64% did not.

Enrolled In 4-Year University

This category includes students who graduated in the spring and enrolled in the following fall at a Texas university or 4-year college.  Just over 75% of the students from Taylor and Cinco Ranch who are in this category obtain a baccalaureate degree within six years.

However, of those that did not receive a baccalareaute degree fewer than 3% at each campus obtain an associate degree or certificate.

Overall, 46.6% of Taylor’s graduates between 2002-2004 earned a baccalaureate degree and 44.2% of Cinco Ranch’s graduates did so as well.  And, about 4% of all the other students earned an associate degree or certificate.

So, that brings us back to the issue of how many out of state graduates do Taylor and Cinco Ranch produce.  As noted before, there are no definitive statistics on this point. However, let’s make the following points for context:

Both Taylor and Cinco Ranch have much higher raw numbers and percentages of students who are in the upper tier of academic performance on traditional college-entrance standards that are totally independent of the State’s deeply flawed assessment tests and accountability system. 

Translated, both schools have a lot of very smart kids and many of these students do extremely well in their post high school academic endeavors. And one does not have to trust the untrustworthy government of Texas to know that.

There is no question whatsoever that these schools produce many high school graduates who can qualify, attend, and graduate from prestigious out of state universities.  That, however, does not mean that significant percentages are doing that.

There is also no question that each of these schools have significant numbers and percentages of students whose performance on college entrance examinations or its precursor Preliminary Scholastic Aptitude Test (PSAT) in the 11th grade indicate average at very best to below average and even poor performance.

It is also a fact that both of these schools send students with extraordinarily high SAT college entrance scores to the state’s top universities including the University of Texas at Austin and Texas A&M at College Station.  Significant numbers of their top graduates also attend other prestigious Texas universities including private universities such as Baylor, Rice, Trinity, and others.

For years, I have collected independent raw data on Katy I.S.D. student performance not described by the TEA’s marginally valuable testing program or Academic Excellence Indicator System report card.

For instance, I have detailed data on the enrolling freshman classes at the University of Texas at Austin for six academic  years ending in 2004 - ironically the last year of the current report being cited from the THECB.

 When one poses the question about how many of our best students are leaving Texas to go to prestigious universities, there is no definitive answer.  However, we know certain things.

Most students (not all) who attend these out of state Tier 1 universities or private institutions have very high SAT scores (or ACT as the particular institution may dictate.)

Because of my data on Katy I.S.D. graduates who attend the University of Texas at Austin, we also know their average SAT scores in math and reading. By logical extension, we can deduce that other students attending other prestigious Texas universities probably fit a similar profile.  That is a safe deduction based upon numerous and other known facts.

Now, for instance, let’s look at the SAT scores of Cinco Ranch graduates who enrolled at the University of Texas at Austin in 2004.  Out of a perfect score of 1600 on the reading and math SAT tests, the average Cinco Ranch entrance score was 1323.

That is a score that is academically outstanding on its own merits and well above the mean SAT scores of all that school’s high school graduates.

Within that group of enrolling freshmen at UT Austin from Cinco Ranch that year, the SAT scores of the top 25% was at or above 1430 in math and reading.  These are score that put a student into the mix of Ivy League colleges and other prestigious institutions.

Interestingly, the ‘cut score’ at the 50th percentile of these Cinco Ranch students was 1370. These are students who have a wide range of options as to where they go to college.

The cut score for the 75th percentile of these students was 1280, well above the mean scores for all ethnic subgroups at Cinco Ranch.

There is no reason to believe that the profiles of students entering Texas A&M or other top tier public or private universities in Texas varies by any significant margins.

Thus, the notion that a significant percentage of the highest performing students from Taylor and Cinco Ranch (very similar academic profiles) are leaving Texas to go out of state universities is very much open to question.

So, here are some bottom lines:

1. Cinco Ranch and Taylor High School produce a higher number and percentage of its graduates who earn baccalaureate degrees from Texas universities within six years than most high schools in Texas.
2. An average of about 55% of their graduates do not earn a baccalaureate degree in Texas within six years.
3. About 27% to 30% of their graduates do not enroll in Texas colleges or universities. Of those that do not initially enroll in Texas, only about 6% eventually earn a baccalaureate degree in Texas.

So, what are reasonable conclusions to draw?

1. There is a demonstrable gap between the elite students and the average to below average students at those campuses.  Thus the  high ‘average’ performance noted for each campus is dramatically affected by the extraordinary performance of its elite students.
2. If you are not the parent of an elite student at Taylor and Cinco Ranch, you may want to starting asking more definitive questions about some very fundamental issues affecting public education overall and Katy I.S.D. in particular.

These questions could include:

• If my child is one of the 27% to 30% of students at these campuses who did not enroll in a Texas college or university and did not go to an out of state college, what warning signs were there to predict that result?
• If my child is one of the 21% to 22% of students at these campuses who enrolled in a two-year college but did not earn an associate or baccalaureate degree within six years, what warning signs were there to predict that result?

I am a firm believer and active proponent of the premise that not every child should be expected to go to college and get a degree.  I do not assert in any manner that those students who do not go to college are destined to be a failure in life.  Such a notion is not only elitist; it is wrong-headed.

However, I am an equal believer and active proponent of the notion that higher levels of excellence found at such campuses at Cinco Ranch, Taylor, and Seven Lakes High Schools can present a false image of the full range of student success at such campuses.

Further, parents that trust in the image of a campus without understanding the full range of issues of the accountability system and the reporting mechanisms of the Texas Education Agency can be led into a false sense of security about what those reports mean for their own children.

Here’s my bottom lines on these reports from Cinco Ranch and Taylor.

1. If you are the parents of above average to elite students at these two campuses, count your blessings because your children have an ‘e-ticket’ to future success.
2. If you are the parents of the other students, then you should realize that great overall statistics for individual campuses don’t automatically translate to your expectations or children’s futures.

As columns go off the featured post section, they will be added to this easy, ‘catch up’ link.

THERE REALLY IS A WAR ON CLASSROOM TEACHERS IN KATY ISD

6-YEAR COLLEGE GRADUATION RATES FOR MAYDE CREEK HIGH SCHOOL GRADUATES

HARSH REALITIES HAVE DISTRICT’S STATUS QUO DEFENDERS IN FULL PANIC MODE

6-YEAR COLLEGE GRADUATION RATES FOR KATY HIGH SCHOOL GRADUATES

OPEN LETTER TO CLASSROOM TEACHER OF KATY I.S.D.

OPEN LETTER TO KATY I.S.D. PARENTS AND TAXPAYERS

THE PROCESS OF SELECTING AND HOLDING SUPERINTENDENTS ACCOUNTABLE HAS BECOME FUNDAMENTALLY FLAWED

THE PATH TO ACTUAL REFORM GOES THROUGH THE SUPERINTENDENT’S CONTRACT

FRAILEY’S AND BOARD’S METAPHORICAL HATE SPEECH AGAINST CLASSROOM TEACHERS

A WALK DOWN MEMORY LANE TO KATY I.S.D.’S CENTER OF TRUTH

Early voting starts Monday.  The official election day is Saturday, May 12.

When the votes are counted and the winners named that night, Katy I.S.D. will be on a path of reform or it will continue on its backsliding path of management arrogance and school board acquiescence pushing the general public into greater and greater depths of isolation from rational public policy.

Cynthia Blackman has spent about equal parts of her career in the classroom as a teacher and in the private sector as a business owner and manager. She has run a fearless campaign.  This is a person that will laugh in the face of any efforts to intimidate her at the board table. She does not understand the concept of retreat on the core issues that drive her desire to bring reform on behalf of parents, students, taxpayers, and classroom teachers.

Terri Majors is a retired career educator, but that should not be of concern to reformers.  She is the real deal in terms of reform.  She has proved since leaving her last post as principal of a Katy I.S.D. elementary school that she is perhaps the bravest individual to ever enter the public policy arena at the local level.  Efforts to belittle her passion for students and classroom teachers failed miserably. She has proved beyond all reasonable doubt that her dedication for reform will not be swayed.

Cynthia and Terri are ready, willing, and able to join Dr. Bill Proctor and Terry Huckaby to form a new board working majority.  If voters give them the go-ahead, Alton Frailey’s administration will finally and at long last be subjected to management accountability.  The dogmatic, authoritarian, self-righteous, and pompous behavior of Frailey’s self-titled Center of Truth will have to come to grips with the harsh reality they don’t own Katy I.S.D.

The fact that his administration has been allowed by successive and submissive school boards to act like they do will quickly fade in the restoration of appropriate governance.  The voters will prevail on this matter.  That’s the beauty of elections.

Here are the faces of reform.  Put them on the board and reform can begin.

Cynthia Blackman

Terri Majors

Successive administrations and school boards in Katy I.S.D. seem to be fully engaged in that effort on multiple fronts.  One ‘war fronting’ in particular is the administrative process of imposing goofy curriculum mantras on classroom teachers in the guise of ’staff development.’

There is no educational or theoretical concept that may have a logical premise that curriculum administrators cannot destroy in practice.

Differentiated instruction.  Student learning styles.  There’s absolutely nothing inherently wrong with the concept of differentiated instruction.  Learning styles is of course squishy and lends itself to pschobabble. In fact, my teachers way back in the 1950’s and 1960’s understood and used their knowledge of this to become very effective classroom teachers.

However, many modern-day curriculum administrators have latched onto these concepts like intellectual leeches in their phony pursuit of ‘magic bullet’ educational solutions to problems they have largely created.

They offer ’pretend’ solutions to deal with the profoundly disparate academic skills of the 25 to 35 students they have thrown into the modern day classroom of junior and senior high schools. In pursuit of approval by their group-think peers and colleagues, many have become educational groupies - not academic leaders.

So let me take you into an actual staff development session at which many of your classroom teachers were required to attend for guidance and strategies that they were fully expected to implement when they got back to their classrooms.  This actually happened.

The district’s curriculum trainers (contracted and on-staff) addressed language arts teachers at a mandatory staff development training session.  The goal was to help your children’s teachers become more effective teachers. The training was dedicated entirely to the subject of identifying and responding to individual student’s learning styles while offering specific techniques as solutions.

Teachers were told that they needed to identify the individual learning styles of each of the 25 to 30 or more students in each of their classrooms. In this particular example, language art teachers were told they needed to detemine whether each child was a “creative” learner, and “analytical” learner or “practical” learner.

Then, the teacher was told he or she was supposed to craft individual assignments (differentiated instruction) for each of the groups of students. Importantly, teachers were told, this process needed to take place every day throughout the year in order to be effective.

So, what practical advice and examples did the Katy I.S.D. curriculum guru give teachers on how to accomplish this great mission?

The presenter gave the example of studying a novel.  The teacher would then give an assessment (test). The presenter said that students should have different assessments (tests) according to “what kind of intelligence they had (learning styles).”

The presenter said that if a student was an analytical thinker, he should write a five-page paper analyzing the literary elements in the novel.

However, the presenter then said if a student was a creative learner, he could pretend he was the main character; compose a rap song talking about the character’s feelings; and perform it in front of the class thus taking the place of the 5-page paper.

 As an aside, if 20 of the students chose a rap song for one assignment and then performed them, does the presenter realize how many class periods of actual instruction would be eaten up?

At this point, one particularly brave teacher actually interjected comments and questions. Earnestly and politely, the teacher said she would have a serious problem grading these different assessments fairly.  The teacher stated that grades at her campus were a “big deal,” and that teachers were often challenged over grades by parents.

The teacher said she might not know how to grade the rap song especially if she thought it showed no real effort.  However, she said she would have a hard time justifying a low grade (even if she thought it was deserved) on such a subjective, non-academic assignment.  Further, she worried, some students would pick the rap song because it was obviously easier than the more traditional academic assignment.

So what guidance did the curriculum guru offer to the real and practical concerns of this teacher? The presenter responded that all the grading problems could be solved by “having a good rubric to grade by,” and that the teacher should go “online” to find one.

On the second point, the presenter breezily said that “it was up to the teacher to determine if the student was picking the rap song because he really was a creative learner, or just picking it to get an easier assignment.”

He did not how to explain how to justify to parents a decision to allow some students to do a rap song because they were creative learners and not allow other students to do the same assignment because the teacher determined they were lying and just trying to get by with an easier assignment.

There was muffled laughter and rolled eyes at this response.  However, the truth is that most teachers are so beaten down by these presentations that they are just counting the minutes until the ’show’ is over.

There were no further questions.  Why?  Because classroom teachers confronted with such insulting, demeaning professional nonsense quickly learn the rules of the game.  Come; listen; keep your mouth shut; and go back to your classrooms to do the best you can.

There is a war on classroom teachers in Katy I.S.D.  There’s no chance of fully liberating their professionalism on behalf of your children until the current working majority of the school board is ousted.

In the May election, Terri Majors and Cynthia Blackman are prepared to join Dr. Bill Proctor and Terry Huckaby in a new working majority.  That new majority will be dedicated to holding Commander in Chief Alton Frailey and his Center of Truth warriors in his administration accountable for his team’s performance.

As I said in another column today, the choice is between two soft and squishy guys running as independents but with the full blessing of the status quo or two tough as nails ladies ready to help Proctor and Huckaby reform this nonsense.

Here’s my message to classroom teachers and parents:  The cavalry trying to rescue you is on the way, but you have to let them in the Katy I.S.D. Board room to do that.

Of these three successive graduating classes from Mayde Creek High School,  4.1% earned an associate degree from a two-year college while 1.1% earned a certificate as defined by the THECB.

It must be noted that the THECB does not track or report on the graduation rates of those students in Texas who attend out of state higher education institutions.  However, that issue will be addressed later in this column using a wide variety of data to help put the issue in context.

The THECB’s statistics show the following for the cumulative graduating classes of 2002, 2003, and 2004:

• 1,865 - Total Graduates Tracked in Texas
• 792 Students: 42.5% of the 1,865 graduates did NOT enroll immediately in any Texas institution.
• 512 Students: 27.5% of the 1,865 graduates enrolled in the fall after their high school graduation in two-year community colleges in Texas.
• 561 Students: 30.1% of the 1,865 graduates enrolled in the fall after their high school graduation at four-year universities in Texas.

Now, let’s start taking a closer look at those three cohorts or distinct groupings of students. If you want to be able to better understand the implications of this report, you need to stick with this column all the way through.

FIRST COHORT OR GROUP OF STUDENTS: The 42.5% (792) of graduates that did not enroll in Texas immediately after high school graduation

These are students from which the majority of Mayde Creek High School graduates who enrolled in out of state institutions would be found if tracking of them had been accomplished.

Those who want to adopt a defensive posture about this state report may want to assert that if all the graduates of Mayde Creek High School who attended prestigious out-of-state colleges could be counted, the statistics of the THECB report would be less meaningful.

That’s a very tall burden for the defenders of the faith.  The average college entrance SAT test results for Mayde Creek High School graduates in 2004 was about 1050 in math and language but even lower for students in the statistically predominant demographics.

The percent of graduates scoring above 1110 on the SAT tests in math and language was under 40% and even less for the predominant demographic. As an aside, don’t think that this picture has improved dramatically since 2004.

When one reviews the student-by-student (no names) and score-by-score results of 11th grade students at Mayde Creek High School who took the PSAT test, the distributions do NOT support the notion that the ‘pool’ of students who would be leaving the state for prestigious colleges is statistically a great number.

However, it is an absolute fact and must be emphasized that Mayde Creek High School has many extraordinarily well-prepared high school graduates who attend outstanding and rigorous universities in Texas such as UT Austin, Texas A&M, Baylor, Rice, Trinity, Texas Tech, and others. In other words, our best prepared students do not always choose to go out of state.  

However, when all of the available data is triangulated and analyzed, there is every reason to believe that the report from the THECB gives dramatic and sobering insight into this issue. And, you ignore the  underlying meaning of this report at the risk of your children who are coming down the pathway to high school.

So what is the picture shown for this cohort of students?

• Of the 792 graduates in this cohort, less than 1% (6) earned an associate degree, less than 1% earned a certificate, and 1.3% earned a baccalaureate degree in Texas.
• If your graduate does not enroll in an out of state college right out of high school, the statistics show that he or she is not likely to earn an associate degree or a baccalaureate degree.

SECOND COHORT OR GROUP OF STUDENTS: The 27.5% (512) of graduates that enrolled in a community college in the fall immediately after their high school graduation.

Of the 27.5% (512) graduates who enrolled in a community college, 13.5% (69) matriculated to universities to obtain their undergraduate degree. In other words, 13.5% of 27.5% got a baccalaureat degree.

Of these 512 graduates, 10.9% (56 out of 512) got an associate degree.  In other words, 10.9% of 27.5% got an associate degree. Fewer than 3% got a certificate.

So what is the picture shown for this group of students?

• If your child enrolls in a two-year college right out of high school, there’s under a 14% history based upon this report of obtaining a baccalaureate degree and even less in obtaining an associate degree.
• Now, if you believe that this particular group of students includes significant numbers who are leaving community colleges in Texas and transferring to prestigious out of state universities at which they graduate, you are entitled to your hallucinations.

THIRD COHORT OR GROUP OF STUDENTS: The 30.1% (561) of Mayde Creek graduates who enrolled in a Texas university immediately after high school graduation.

Of the 561 Mayde Creek High School graduates tracked by the THECB who enrolled in a Texas university immediately after high school graduation, 60.8% (341 out of 561) earned their baccalaureate degree. 2.5% earned an associate degree and 1.2% earned a certificate.

So what is the picture shown by this?

• If your Mayde Creek High School graduate enrolls immediately in a four-year university, he or she has a much better chance of earning a baccalaureate degree, but still, about 40% of this group dropped out or otherwise did not not earn a baccalaureate degree.
• However, to put the overall number in perspective at Mayde Creek High School for this cohort, about 60% of 30% earned a baccalaureate degree in this cohort.

I have an admonition for parents. And, I have written and spoke about it for well over a decade.

These kinds of results speak directly of the bastardization and corruption of bogus, destructive curriculum strategies and practices that are being forced down the throats of your children’s classroom teachers and your children.

These kinds of results speak directly of the decades long trend of creating and imposing top-down curriculum strategies that make it virtually impossible for your classroom teachers to organize their classrooms in a way to maximize the efficiency and rationality of how they teach your children.

These kinds of results speak directly about an accountability testing process in Texas that has zero connection to academic integrity.  Rather, the testing program is designed to pretend that it is being successful to keep the flow of money growing and uninterrupted.

These kinds of results speak directly about an educational industrial complex ruled by politicians, lawyers, consultants, and big-big-money vendors who prosper in the public trough while your classroom teachers and your students wither under the crushing bureaucracy that feeds these illegitimate forces.

These kinds of results speak directly about school board members that surrender their intelligence and independence and become ‘children-of-the-corn-like’ vessels who become inconsequential cogs in a machine they don’t even want to control.

I’ll be adding the profiles for Taylor and Cinco Ranch High Schools.  The figures are better for Taylor and Cinco Ranch.

In fact, Taylor and Cinco Ranch are rated in the top of major high schools for Texas.  That’s the good news for them. However, even when you look behind their numbers, the storm clouds of mediocrity are very dark.

The likelihood that reforms can be achieved at the state level have diminished greatly in direct proportion to the declining credibility of the Texas Legislature and the declining calibre of leadership that serves on local school boards.

The best way to fight these trends on behalf of your children is at your local school board. And that process starts with cleaning house by defeating all “status quo” current members and replacing them with people who have the intellectual honesty to confront reality.

My vote this May will be to achieve a new working majority on the board in Katy, and I’ll be voting for Terri Majors and Cynthia Blackman. If the community does not give our first leaders on the school board in more than a decade the support they must have, any reform will be lost.

Dr. Bill Proctor and Terry Huckaby have more than earned the support of putting them in a working board majority.

It has brought out the status quo’s  ’faithful but cowardly and anonymous acolytes and posters’ in droves over at Instant News Katy.  At first, they sought refuge in assertions that the material was wrong.  When reality would not budge, they sought refuge in the notion that the deficiencies could certainly be explained by asserting that huge numbers of Katy High School graduates were leaving Texas to graduate from college.

While there are certainly those that do just that, reality does not permit that ‘explanation’ to explain the overall situation that Katy High School now confronts.  Finally, as is often the case, when reality persists, those who defend the lies of the past resort to attacking the messengers. It’s tried and true.  They must have channeled Dick Nixon.

“Baby Tiger” is one of those anonymous bloggers over at Instant News Katy who is reaching new heights of intellectual desperation in his support of his two kinder and gentler candidates for the Katy I.S.D. School Board.

 ”Baby Tiger” apparently believes that electing two soft, squishy gentlemen running with the blessing of the status quo over two tough-as-nails women in Terri Major and Cynthia Blackman who are seeking reform is the solution the community needs.

“Baby Tiger” is one of the many who simply lacks the intellectual discipline or the intellectual curiosity to really understand what’s happening in Katy I.S.D. in particular and public education in general.

Here’s a quote from “Baby Tiger” regarding Supt. Alton Frailey and the subject of holding him accountable for both his performance and the performance of his administrative team:

“Frailey’s contract and what it states isn’t the problem… Lack of supervision, clear and measurable goals, solid direction in academics and the accountability to meet or exceed those goals is the problem…”

What Baby Tiger does not understand is that the superintendent of schools is the only employee that can be evaluated by the Board of Trustees.  Baby Tiger does not understand that the process by which the current school board can evaluate the superintendent is a matter of contract law. And, the current superintendent of schools in Katy I.S.D. has a contract that has no relevant standards of evaluation that allow the current school board to hold him genuinely and routinely responsible for the programs that he and his administration impose on the system.

Baby Tiger lives in a delusional world that he has created for himself and in which he has apparently grown quite comfortable.

So when Baby Tiger (and those like him) gets upset with those of us who are distributing facts to the general public about the success or lack thereof of our high school graduates in college, he gets mad and pretends the solutions are apparently as simple as snapping one’s fingers.

This year represents a tough and pivotal battle for reform in Katy I.S.D.  It began last year with the election of Dr. Bill Proctor and Terry Huckaby.  It will culminate this year with the election of Terri Majors and Cynthia Blackman or it will stop dead in its tracks.

There are harsh realities that Baby Tiger and his anonymous band of defenders of the status quo simply and apparently don’t understand.

1. Successive school administrations in Katy I.S.D. have declared metaphorical war on classroom teachers. And successive feckless school boards have empowered their administrators to do so.
2. Successive school administrations in Katy I.S.D. have imposed one stupid and ridiculous ‘magic pill’ curriculum scheme after another on classroom teachers.  And successive feckless school boards have empowered their administrators to do so.
3. Successive school administrations in Katy I.S.D. have failed miserably to demonstrate that the schemes they have imposed on the classroom teachers of your children have been effective.  And successive feckless school boards have sat silently and let their administrators get by with it.

After much more than a decade of “Pied Piper” like curriculum strategies that have empowered the growing bureaucracy in this school district and enriched private sector consultants and corporations, the ‘chickens are coming home to roost.’

I have written on many occasions that every high school in Katy I.S.D. has produced outstanding graduates who have achieved great success in their future academic endeavors.  But, I have also written that the gap between our great and elite students and everyone else is growing wider and wider by the year.

I have written on many occasions that if your child is not one of the genuine elite students, you have massive cause for concern about what is happening in your children’s classrooms. The figures from the state’s Higher Education Coordinating Board now give even more substance to that reality.

More than ever before, the general public is beginning to focus on this reality.  Last year, the public butt-kicked two incumbents off the school board and elected Proctor and Huckaby. This year, the choice is equally clear.

There are two kinder and gentler guys running claiming to be independents but who run with the full blessing of the status quo.  That should worry parents who have begun to see the relationship between an out of control bureaucracy and your children’s education.

There are two women running who understand these issues down to the core level.  Cynthia Blackman and Terri Majors are ready to help Proctor and Huckaby pursue reform and finally bring accountability to an administration and school board consumed with arrogance of power of power.

These four understand that there will be no reform in this school district until the school board’s and the administration’s war on classroom teachers is stopped dead in its tracks.

The choice that the public confronts is simple:  two soft and squishy guys running campaigns to endear themselves as electable or two tough ladies in Cynthia Blackman and Terri Majors who have the courage to tell the truth when the truth is not always pleasant.

Please excuse me for falling back on this play on words.  It’s clear that May 2012 is time to elect two women to do what we used to call a ‘man’s job’ because the women in this race are up to the job and the guys show no indication that they even understand what the job is.

And when the public does this, it will have two tough men in Proctor and Huckaby and two tough women in Majors and Blackman.  By any standard, that will be fair and balanced reform.

Baby Tiger and his ilk don’t understand this.  For the sake of your children, I genuinely hope the majority of parents in Katy I.S.D. do finally understand.  I hope they will take the actions necessary in this next school board election to take back control of their school district from out of control administrators and their enablers in the current working majority on the school board.