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Happy Earth Week 🌎 and STAAR testing season! 💻
In this edition you can read more about our request for an informal review 📝of the Texas Education Agency's special education conservatorship, and learn about the district's plan 📈 for resolving the challenges ahead.
We also want to tell you about a new website with discounts and incentives for ϱ ISD staff at 37 apartment complexes across ϱ.
The Latin American Achievement Awards 🏆 celebrate their ܾԳñ this Friday, April 21 at 6:30 pm at the ϱ ISD PAC. This is the 15th year of the award ceremony 🎉 recognizing Latino community leaders and students in grades 7-12 who excel in their academic work.
…and everyone is invited to join the 2024 💰 community budget conversations. These are happening virtually 💻 on Tuesday, April 25 & Wednesday, April 26 🗓 in English and Spanish.
Heads up: BOLT applications will be unavailable the weekend of April 29-30 for system maintenance. 🛠 BOLT is expected to be back online Monday, May 1. We’ll have a reminder with more details next week. 🗓
We wish a Happy Eid al Fitr Mubarak to those who celebrate, marking the end of Ramadan this weekend.💚
Alright, let’s jump in and see 👀 what’s going on around the district.
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Staff Weekly
By Paul Stinson● Apr 21, 2023
Smart Brevity® count: 5 mins...1362 words
Happy Earth Week 🌎 and STAAR testing season! 💻
In this edition you can read more about our request for an informal review 📝of the Texas Education Agency's special education conservatorship, and learn about the district's plan 📈 for resolving the challenges ahead.
We also want to tell you about a new website with discounts and incentives for ϱ ISD staff at 37 apartment complexes across ϱ.
The Latin American Achievement Awards 🏆 celebrate their ܾԳñ this Friday, April 21 at 6:30 pm at the ϱ ISD PAC. This is the 15th year of the award ceremony 🎉 recognizing Latino community leaders and students in grades 7-12 who excel in their academic work.
…and everyone is invited to join the 2024 💰 community budget conversations. These are happening virtually 💻 on Tuesday, April 25 & Wednesday, April 26 🗓 in English and Spanish.
Heads up: BOLT applications will be unavailable the weekend of April 29-30 for system maintenance. 🛠 BOLT is expected to be back online Monday, May 1. We’ll have a reminder with more details next week. 🗓
We wish a Happy Eid al Fitr Mubarak to those who celebrate, marking the end of Ramadan this weekend.💚
Alright, let’s jump in and see 👀 what’s going on around the district.
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1 Big Thing: ϱ ISD requests 📝informal review of TEA Special Education Conservatorship
On Monday, ϱ ISD requested an informal review of the Texas Education Agency’s March 31, 2023, Final Report that recommended a conservator to help address special education issues in the district. 🏫
What they’re saying: “We believe that the least disruptive way to build momentum toward sustainable, transformational improvements to special education is to allow our most recent plans and improved systems to fully take hold,” said Superintendent Segura.
Catch up quick: We have been working closely with TEA for more than a year to catch up 📉 on our backlog of Special Education evaluations.
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In early January, we requested that TEA assign a monitor to make recommendations and partner with us in our work around special education evaluations and services.🎓
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In late March, TEA responded with its intent to assign a team of conservators, which is a level of escalation above a monitor.
The details: We are still learning what a conservatorship could look like but TEA’s report told us that “the duties and powers assigned to the Management Team should be expansive enough to direct all areas affecting, or affected by, special education, even if not made immediately obvious by its name.”
🎒 The bottom line: The district takes full ownership of the problems that have led TEA to issue sanctions. We are focused on resolving the backlog as quickly as possible and making sustainable, transformational improvements to our Special Education program.
Go deeper with our TEA conservator FAQs and Board President Singh’s message to the community.
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2. New website debuts with apartment discounts for ϱ ISD teachers, staff
A new partnership between ϱ ISD and the ϱ Apartment Association (AAA) offers discounts 💰 and incentives at apartment complexes around ϱ, to help teachers and staff battle the high cost of housing.🏘
Home sweet cheaper home: ϱ ISD staff can now access an to find complexes that offer 💵 discounts and incentives for ϱ ISD employees.
By the numbers: So far, 37 apartment complexes are offering 👀 special deals for ϱ ISD employees, and AAA is working to recruit more complexes for the program.
🎒 Context: The new feature is the result of collaboration between ϱ ISD’s Human Capital Employee Experience & Sustainability team and the ϱ ISD Real Estate Office.
Go deeper: In a recent, employees noted housing needs and cost of living as a significant barrier to recruitment and retention.
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3. An Iraqi 🇮🇶 teacher 🍎 gives families a voice 📣 at Travis Heights Elementary School 🏫
As ϱ ISD 🎉celebrates Arab American Heritage Month, we profile Sura Jasim, who works at Travis Heights Elementary School as a Parent Support Specialist, a link between the school district and parents.
Sura Jasim still remembers what it is like to arrive 🛬in this country without knowing anyone, feeling insecure and – perhaps most importantly – not being able to understand the U.S. 🎒educational system. That was Jasim’s experience when she and her family first arrived from 🇮🇶Iraq. But for the past four years she has made it her mission to prevent those same feelings for newcomer families at Travis Heights Elementary.🏫
“We help the parents have a voice 📣 in the school and also direct them where to go when they have an issue,” said Jasim, a Parent Support Specialist (PSS).
📣What’s a PSS? ϱ ISD has over 70 PSS’s across the district, primarily in Title I schools. PSS’s work directly with families, campus staff and community members to help families support their children’s educational goals.
🛬 From Baghdad to ϱ: Jasim arrived in ϱ with her husband and two children in 🗓 2015. Back home 🏠 in Iraq, she had a career as an elementary school science 🔬 teacher. But because of violence and insecurity, Jasim, her husband and their two children left Baghdad to start a new life in Texas.🤠
🔗Link in the chain: For Jasim, being the communication 🖇link between parents and their children's school 🏫is something she is passionate about and does with a lot of love. She encourages parents to ask for help when they need it.
🏫“Travis Heights is Community:” Although she misses her home country, Jasim feels that Travis Heights Elementary School has become her new home, a diverse community that helps fill the void left by her homeland. Jasim describes the 🏫 school community as a 🌎 world of different languages and ʵ cultures together under one roof, where 🎉celebrations of diverse cultures are highly valued and appreciated.
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Jasim loves💛 to teach the students about 🇮🇶Iraqi culture and traditions.
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She is also grateful to 🍎Principal Michelle Amezquita-Navarro, who she says believed in her by giving her the opportunity to be part of the school.🏫
✈Homecoming: Jasim is 🗓 planning a trip home to 🛫Baghdad this summer, her first in four years. She’ll visit family, friends and above all to relive the memories 💛that she misses so much and carries in her heart.
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(KXAN)
(KVUE)
(Statesman)
(Univision 62 ϱ)
(Texas Tribune)
(KUT)
(Community Impact)
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Paul is listening to Beth Orton’s Central Reservation, and managing his playoff expectations 🏀 for the Minnesota Timberwolves and Minnesota Wild 🏒.
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