Fort Worth ISD trustees vote down a new five-year strategic plan. What happens now?

A proposed five-year strategic plan that Fort Worth school officials hoped would help students get back on track academically was voted down at a school board meeting Tuesday night.

Among other things, the plan, which was months in the making, called for more teacher training, expanded academic support for students who are struggling and better communication with families. Some board members said they wanted time to gather more public input on the plan before adopting it.

Board President Camille Rodriguez pressed for a vote Tuesday evening, saying it was crucial that the district have a plan approved before the first day of school on Aug. 13 . She argued that Superintendent Angélica Ramsey needed to be able to take the plan to school principals to discuss the district’s direction as they prepare for the new school year.

But board member Roxanne Martinez said she worried that not enough parents had been able to weigh in on the plan. The district convened focus groups and community forums and placed a link to a survey on its website. But Martinez, who has children enrolled in the district, said she never got a text message about the survey.

The district regularly sends texts and emails when it needs to get in touch with parents, and Martinez said many rely on those channels of communication for their information. Especially during the summer, when most families aren’t as engaged with school, it’s important that the district be intentional about reaching them, she said.

“We have to reach our parents where they are,” she said.

Board member Wallace Bridges said he thought it was important that the entire board be present for the vote. Members Anne Darr and Kevin Lynch were absent from the meeting. Having the full board vote on the proposal sends a message to the community about the importance of the plan. He also said he would have liked to see Ramsey take a larger role in communicating the proposal to the community, rather than leaving it to campus principals.

Ultimately, the board voted 5-2 to reject the proposal, with Rodriguez and board member Quinton Phillips voting in favor. Martinez, Bridges, Tobi Jackson, Anael Luebanos and Michael Ryan voted against it.

“I do not know what our next steps are for this school district,” Rodriguez said, before moving on to the next agenda item.

FWISD plan called for STAAR score improvements

Included in the proposal were goals for the district’s performance on the State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness, or STAAR . Under the plan, district leaders hoped to see third-grade reading and math scores steadily improve over the next five years. By 2029, the plan called for 50% of third-graders to score on grade level or better in both reading and math on the state test.

The same goal would have applied to students in upper grades. The plan’s goals called for half of all students in grades 6-8 to meet or exceed grade level in reading and math by 2029. If the district meets that goal, it would amount to 30 percentage points of growth in math and almost 20 points in reading.

The proposal placed special emphasis on helping Black and disabled students, as well as students who are learning English, improve their academic performance. All three of those groups lag behind their peers academically. Deputy Superintendent Karen Molinar said district leaders know they need to support and intensify the instruction those students get in class.

The proposal called for district leaders to improve STAAR scores by offering professional development to teachers and expanding the use of systems to identify students who are struggling in reading or math so teachers could more quickly offer them extra support.

Besides offering professional development to teachers, the district also needs to make sure all educators — teachers, building administrators and support staffers like reading specialists — have what they need to do their jobs well, Molinar said.

The district’s state reading test scores have been stagnant for the past few years, trailing behind pre-pandemic norms more than two years after schools reopened. On last spring’s test, 33% of third-graders met or exceeded grade level in reading, the same percentage who met that threshold in 2019 and a one-point uptick over last year. But 40% of third-graders in the district didn’t meet or approach grade level in reading this year, compared to 36% in 2019.

The picture is little better in upper grades. This year, 30% of seventh-graders scored on grade level or better in reading, down from 32% last year. Among eighth-graders, just 22% scored on grade level, the same percentage as last year.

Plan called for better communication, teacher retention

Improving academic performance was the first of four goals outlined in the proposal. The plan also called for the district to improve students’ and families’ school experience; find ways to recruit, retain and develop staff ; and improve the district’s organizational effectiveness, including by doing a better job of communicating with families. District leaders developed the plan based on input from more than 1,000 community members who spoke during focus groups and community forums, as well as more than 3,700 who filled out the community survey. Molinar said participants identified academic performance as the highest priority.

During a public comment session before the plan was presented, Amy Super, a Fort Worth resident, called on the board to hold district leaders accountable when students don’t make progress. She pointed to a previous set of district goals that called for 47% of third-graders to be reading on grade level by 2022. Two years later, the district is still well shy of that mark.

The fact that so many students can’t read proficiently in third grade is especially worrisome because of how it affects them for the rest of their academic careers, Super said. Education leaders often say third grade is the point where students stop learning to read and start reading to learn. If students can’t read well by that point, Super asked, what are they supposed to do going forward?

“Our kids cannot settle for this anymore,” Super told board members. “This is on you. Please step up to the plate.”