Grading Texas

Guess who still is promising teachers a pay raise?

It is the same state official who promised teachers a raise at the beginning of the regular legislative session in January and then a few months later killed any chance of one as the session was coming to an end. That, of course, would be Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, whose top priorities have been and still are tax cuts, private school vouchers and stoking the culture war, not educator pay.

Early on in this year of a record, $33 billion budget surplus, Patrick’s idea of a teacher pay “raise” wasn’t even a raise, but a stingy one-time bonus of $2,000 for most teachers, those who teach most Texas students in the larger districts. Teachers in districts with fewer than 20,000 students, including most charter schools, would have received a one-time bonus of $6,000.

The House ignored the Senate bill and substituted its version of a pay raise, which wasn’t much better, in a school finance bill, which Patrick killed at the end of the session by holding it hostage to vouchers, which the House refused to pass. That ploy killed not only a minimal teacher raise but also an increase in the basic funding allotment for school districts that could have been used to increase pay for school support staff as well.

Now, Patrick and Speaker Dade Phelan have resolved their differences over property tax relief by agreeing on an $18 billion package of tax cuts that, if approved by the Legislature in the second special session, will consume more than half of the surplus but add not a penny to public school funding or educator pay.

Yet, right after the tax cut deal had been announced, Patrick was on a WFAA-TV podcast, The Dallas Morning News reported, trying to reassure teachers that he hadn’t forgotten them.

“The House decided they wanted just to keep that (teacher pay) separate from the property tax bill, and I respected that,” Patrick was quoted as saying. “We will address that in a later session and, look, we’re going to get teachers a pay raise.”

Gov. Greg Abbott has repeatedly said he will call another special session later this year to try to force lawmakers to enact vouchers. The governor may add teacher pay and other issues to that session’s agenda, but vouchers will be the governor’s and Patrick’s top priority. And any educator who thinks Patrick won’t again hold a pay raise hostage to a voucher bill if he feels that is necessary to get his way had better not start counting that pay raise yet.

Patrick can make all the promises he wants, but the best chance teachers have of getting a meaningful pay raise from the Legislature this year is to band together with TSTA and demand one – loudly and repeatedly. They also need to demand funding for pay increases for bus drivers, teachers’ aides and other school support staff.

Clay Robison

While top state officials are arguing during a summer legislative session about the best way to spend billions of dollars on property tax relief instead of additional school funding, teachers and school districts are preparing for the next school year, and it isn’t an easy task.

One thing the small but growing Terrell ISD, which has about 5,000 students east of Dallas, is doing is raising charitable contributions for classroom supplies for all nine of its campuses. This “Adopt a Classroom” program isn’t new. The district apparently does this every year. But the fundraising is particularly critical now, following the Legislature’s failure during its regular session to increase the basic allotment that determines how much state funding districts receive based on the number of students the district educates.

Remember, the Legislature began the regular session in January with a $33 billion budget surplus, but Gov. Greg Abbott and legislative leaders immediately decided to dedicate about half of it to pay for property tax relief. The Legislature then passed a new state budget that set aside $5.3 billion to pay for property tax cuts lawmakers approved two years ago and another $12.3 billion to pay for new cuts.

Abbott and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick also tried to spend as much as a half billion dollars on private school vouchers, but that effort died in the House. Additional funding for public schools and pay raises also died after Patrick and the Senate held a school finance bill hostage to vouchers.

Now, a special session is in limbo because Patrick, on one side, and Abbott and Speaker Dade Phelan, on the other, disagree about the best way to provide the new tax cuts. Whatever they eventually may decide, none of the tax relief money will increase overall funding for school districts or school supplies or give educators pay raises.

Meanwhile, Terrell ISD is trying to raise $60,000 from parents and other people who, unlike some state leaders, value public education. The district wants to reach its goal by July 21 to leave time to distribute the proceeds in the form of gift cards to teachers before the tax-exempt August weekend for purchasing school supplies.

Other districts – but not all of them — may be doing the same thing because teachers across Texas often must dig into their own pockets to purchase supplies their under-funded districts can’t afford. According to a survey TSTA conducted of its members last year, the average Texas teacher was spending $846 a year on these teaching necessities, $108 more than just a few years earlier.

With about 320,000 teachers in Texas, these out-of-pocket expenses represent a $270 million subsidy that underpaid teachers essentially are giving to the state government, with the size of the subsidy continuing to increase as inflation continues to erode educators’ paychecks.

What are Abbott, Patrick, et al doing about it? Fiddling over tax relief and pretending to be concerned about the teacher shortage.

Clay Robison

I hope Supt. Mike Miles and the new board of managers that Education Commissioner Mike Morath has chosen to lead the state’s largest school district can continue – and improve upon — the progress that already was being made by HISD educators before Morath pushed aside the district’s locally elected school board and superintendent.

The futures of HISD’s students depend on it.

But the last time Miles took over a big Texas school district – Dallas ISD – his three-year tenure from 2012 to 2015 was mainly marked by controversy and turbulence that ended in him resigning in the middle of his contract. Some school board members were happy to see him go. That group, however, must not have included Morath, who was on the board at the time.

Miles had big ideas for Dallas, but he often seemed as interested in playing dictator and amassing his own power structure as he did in improving outcomes for students.

In the name of “reform,” he assembled a highly paid management team that helped him create a toxic working environment for many teachers and other employees and a hostile learning environment for students. One of his chiefs of staff resigned shortly before he was indicted on federal bribery charges – unrelated to DISD — that resulted in a conviction and prison sentence.

Miles also employed a human resources manager for the district, who according to an internal investigation reported by The Dallas Morning News, lied, bullied staffers and falsified records.

Teachers were saddled with excessive paperwork and excessive meetings, and some were chastised by administrators in front of their students during surprise classroom visits. He also imposed an evaluation system that did not truly measure the work that educators were doing.

On some occasions, Miles ignored the will of school board members who had been elected by district parents and other local taxpayers. He won’t have to worry about elected board members in his Houston job, but how well will he work with the appointed board whose members Morath also has made responsible for student success in the district?

Miles once fired three principals in Dallas who had the support of a board majority. One of the fired principals had been praised by the then-board president for her work and strong engagement with parents.

At another time, he ordered Dallas ISD police to physically remove one school board member from a school campus in the district she was elected to represent.

NEA-Dallas, TSTA’s local affiliate, had long demanded Miles’ removal before he finally quit.

The state took over Houston ISD because of failing STAAR scores. According to The Dallas Morning News, STAAR scores stayed flat or dropped in Dallas ISD during Miles’ tenure.

The Morning News also reported that, as Miles was departing, he compared the Dallas school district to Camelot and himself to King Arthur.

Dallas ISD is not Camelot. Houston ISD isn’t Camelot either, and it doesn’t need King Arthur. It needs a superintendent who will respect and listen to HISD teachers, not bully them. HISD teachers already had done a lot to improve the district’s performance before Morath intervened and Miles arrived. They will do more, if the new superintendent doesn’t drive them away.

Clay Robison

The day after a gunman used an assault rifle to kill eight people and wound several others at an outlet mall in Allen, Gov. Greg Abbott went on Fox News, seeking cover with an audience that he knew would be friendly toward his predictable – and cowardly – decision to dismiss once again calls for reasonable gun reform.

Instead, he talked about improving mental health services, hollow talk from someone who has rarely tried to do that during more than eight years – and several mass shootings – as governor. Just a few days earlier, Forbes had issued a new report ranking Texas last among the states for mental health care, sometimes a contributor to violence but not necessarily a predictor of homicidal behavior.

Abbott also joined Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and Attorney General Ken Paxton for services at Cottonwood Creek Church in Allen, where congregants sang “Amazing Grace” during a solemn vigil for the shooting victims.

Abbott, Patrick and Paxton, all of whom put gun rights above victims’ rights, are well-practiced at this mourning business, well-practiced to the point of hypocrisy. Anybody can mourn. But only the governor, the lieutenant governor and a few other elected officials have the authority to take the lead and actually do something to try to prevent future mass shootings, or at least make it as difficult as possible for people to use weapons of war to carry out their hatred or anger against strangers who are trying to peacefully live their lives.

Abbott and Patrick have done absolutely nothing to keep guns, including assault rifles, out of the hands of dangerous people. And had they done so, Paxton probably would have filed a lawsuit against them.

Meanwhile, the carnage keeps piling up – a church in Sutherland Springs, a high school in Santa Fe, a Walmart in El Paso, a shooting rampage in Midland and Odessa, an elementary school in Uvalde and now a shopping mall in Allen. All these atrocities were committed on Abbott’s and Patrick’s watch, and these are just the ones most of us remember.

The only change Abbott, Patrick and their allies have made in Texas gun laws during that span of shootings has been to increase the availability of guns in Texas with a law allowing just about any adult to carry a handgun, without a license or any training. And if an ill-conceived bill now pending in the Legislature to increase the number of guns in Texas schools by arming more school employees makes it to Abbott’s desk, he will likely sign it.

Abbott, Patrick, et al so far haven’t even considered something as limited and sensible as a law to raise the minimum age for purchasing an assault rifle from 18 to 21, even after an 18-year-old shooter used an assault rifle he had legally purchased to kill 19 children and two teachers in Uvalde and injure others. A House committee, after sitting on it for weeks, finally approved that bill following the Allen shooting. But will the measure clear all the parliamentary hurdles and win both House and Senate approval during the legislative session’s closing days? If so, will Abbott sign it? So far, he has opposed it.

For years, the governor and his allies have been cowards in fear of the gun lobby and washed their hands of their responsibility to public safety. I have no expectation that my anger and the anger of millions of other Texans who don’t share their political views will make any difference to them now.

But next time, governor, please spare us the faux tears after the shooting stops.

Clay Robison