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<< Back to Texas Education News Page Mapping Educational Progress 2008 Data on student achievement in reading and math, high school graduation rates, schools making adequate yearly progress, highly qualified teachers, parents taking advantage of tutoring and choice options, state participation in flexibility options, and more. National Report: A Little Now for a Lot Later: A Look at a Texas Advanced Placement Incentive Program The Advanced Placement Incentive Program (APIP) is a novel program that includes cash incentives for both teachers and students for each passing score earned on an Advanced Placement (AP) exam. The APIP was first implemented in ten Dallas schools in 1996, and has been expanded to over forty schools in Texas. The program is targeted primarily to low-income, minority-majority school districts with a view towards improving college readiness. Due to the perceived success of this program, a similar scheme has been adopted in New Mexico and several other US districts are following suit. Cash incentives for students is an understudied phenomena, thus given their growing popularity, it is important to understand (1) whether student incentive programs work, (2) how students of different gender and race may respond to such programs (3) the possible deleterious effects of such programs and (4) the mechanisms through which these incentives may affect student outcomes. To this end, this paper analyzes the APIP, and estimates its effect on outcomes such as high-school graduation, SAT/ACT performance, and college matriculation. The paper concludes that Adoption of the AP incentive program is associated with a 30 percent increase in the number of students scoring above 1100 on the SAT or 24 on the ACT, and an 8 percent increase in the number of students who matriculate in college in Texas. The per-student costs of the program are very small relative to reasonable estimates of the implied lifetime benefits that accrue to affected students such that the APIP may ameliorate sub-optimal educational investments. Empirical evidence suggests that teachers and students were not simply aiming to maximize their rewards. Anecdotal evidence suggests that the increases in AP participation were due to better access to AP courses, changes in teacher and peer norms towards AP courses, and better student information. Complete paper: Related article: Edweek’s Editorial Projects in Education Research Center States awarded overall letter grades based on ratings across six areas of performance and policy: chance-for-success; K-12 achievement; standards, assessments, and accountability; transitions and alignment; the teaching profession; and school finance. QUALITY COUNTS 2008 GRADING SUMMARY
OVERALL GRADE: B- Full Texas Report: http://www.edweek.org/media/ew/qc/2008/18shr.tx.h27.pdf The national Report is here: http://www.edweek.org/media/ew/qc/2008/18shr.us.h27.pdf State Reports are here: http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2008/01/10/18shr.h27.html The Funding Gap: Spending Less Money in School Districts Educating English Language Learners, Low-Income Students and Students of Color When it comes to school funding, too many states still provide the least to school districts serving students with the greatest needs, according to a report released by The Education Trust. The seventh in a series of annual reports, The Funding Gap includes state-by-state analyses of funding trends from 1999 to 2005, comparing the resources available to school districts serving the highest percentages of low-income students and students of color to the resources available to districts serving the lowest percentages of such students. For the first time, the report also compares funding available to school districts serving the high percentages of English language learners (ELL) to that available to districts serving the lowest percentages of ELL. Using data for the eight states with the highest percentages of English learners, the report finds that high-ELL districts generally receive less financial support than do districts with few or no ELL students. The Bad News In 1999, Illinois’ funding gap was the second-largest in the nation. By 2005, the Illinois gap was still the second-largest, and had actually gotten worse. Illinois is joined by Florida, Idaho, Kansas, Maine, Missouri, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont, Virginia and Wisconsin at the top of the list of states in which the funding gap between high- and low-poverty districts grew between 1999 and 2005. Full report: SAIPE - 2005 School District Files Layout The files in the data directory contain estimates of population and poverty. The school districts for which we have estimates were identified in the 2005 school district mapping project, which asked about all school districts as of January 1, 2006. The 2005 estimates reflect poverty in 2005 of the population in 2005 for school district boundaries in the 2005-2006 school year. There is one file for each of the states, the District of Columbia, and the entire United States. Each file contains the FIPS state code, Department of Education Common Core of Data (CCD) ID numbers, District names, the total population, population of school-age children, and estimated number of school-age children in poverty related to the head of the household.
Access school district data files for 2005 (TX): Humble Independent School District Opens Care ATC On-site Clinics As insurance and health care costs spiral upward and employers look for ways to minimize the impact on their operations, the national trend of providing worksite medical care continues to grow. Tulsa-based Care ATC and Houston-based TriSurant introduced new on-site physician clinics in Kingwood Dec. 1 and in Humble Oct. 1. The number of organizations who offer on-site medical services has increased significantly in recent years. Nearly one-fourth of large businesses reported offering on-site medical services at the end of this past year, according to the non-profit National Business Group on Health. Another six percent reported they plan to open clinics in the next year. Deductibles, co-pays and waiting rooms are a nuisance of the past for employees of the district. The clinics offer comprehensive health care to its 2,700+ eligible employees and family members at on-site clinics with easy access to the doctor. On-site clinics are gaining popularity with many employer groups. As employers are struggling to control skyrocketing medical costs, clinics at the workplace are becoming part of the answer. Care ATC’s model has been shown to provide annual savings of $1,300 per employee compared to national trends. Rogers said companies using Care ATC’s services see both short-term and long-term savings. Organizations that have used this service for five years enjoy total health care costs that are lower than they were the year before opening clinics, inclusive of the costs for Care ATC services. According to Dr. Mary Widmier, Humble ISD’s Assistant Superintendent for Human Resources, the response to the clinics has been tremendous. Care ATC and TriSurant worked closely with Humble ISD to customize the clinics to meet the district’s unique needs and interests. The clinics offer more one-on-one time with doctors than traditional primary care clinics, provide lab testing and other services at no cost to the patients. In addition employees' family members on the organization’s health plan can utilize the clinics. Tyler Technologies Continues Growth in School Market with Two New Contracts in Texas Tyler Technologies, Inc. has signed two new contracts to provide its MUNIS financial management solution to the Spring Branch and Humble Independent School Districts (ISD) in Texas. The software contracts, worth a combined $3.3 million, include related professional services, ongoing maintenance and support. The Spring Branch ISD and the Humble ISD each purchased a comprehensive package of Tyler’s MUNIS financial software suite. They also selected human resource and revenue applications. Both districts will complement these selections with integrated solutions to improve productivity and reporting capabilities. “The support offered by Tyler—and reported by its existing clients—combined with the success of other districts who have implemented the MUNIS solution factored significantly into our decision to purchase MUNIS,” said the Spring Branch ISD’s Associate Superintendent for Finance Karen Wilson. “We appreciate the solution’s flexibility and Tyler’s implementation approach, which focuses on the needs of each client rather than taking an assembly line rollout approach. Tyler’s dedication to continual product enhancement and improvement, which is a high-priority for the Spring Branch ISD, also influenced our choice.” Located in Houston, Texas, the Spring Branch ISD educates approximately 33,000 pre-Kindergarten through grade 12 students at 46 schools and has more than 4,600 employees. The district has a total annual operating budget of approximately $250 million. Shelley Vineyard, director of special projects for the Humble ISD, cited several factors as influencing the District’s purchase. “Tyler’s strong understanding of change management and the role it plays in a successful implementation impacted our selection of its MUNIS solution. We also like that Tyler has a large implementation staff with Project Management Institute training. Specifically, MUNIS has excellent workflow tools, strong employee self-service features and a GASB 34 Reporter Writer application that will enable the District to improve our business operations,” she explained. The Humble ISD currently serves approximately 33,000 students from pre-Kindergarten through grade 12 in the communities of Humble, Kingwood and Atascocita, and covers 90 square miles in Harris County. The district employs 2,600 teachers and is the 35th largest district in Texas. Student enrollment is expected to reach 40,000 students by 2012. The city of Humble is located just 18 miles northeast of Houston. Cypress Fairbanks ISD Deploys Mirage Networks Texas’ Third Largest School District Leverages Patented NAC Solution to Control Rogue Network Devices Cypress Fairbanks Independent School District in Houston has deployed Mirage to protect its infrastructure from unknown and out-of-policy endpoints. “With the Mirage solution I have saved countless hours trying to identify and isolate unapproved machines from our network,” said Frederick Brenz, network and telecom manager for Cypress Fairbanks ISD. “Before Mirage, we would dispatch an IT tech to a school who would need to search classrooms, labs, and offices to root out each unauthorized device, which could take days. Our campus is spread out over a large geographic area in Houston, so this is an important issue that the Mirage solution has resolved.” About Cypress Fairbanks Independent School District Weslaco Independent School District Selects Management Software Weslaco Independent School District (ISD), has selected the Redcell™ enterprise edition product suite to consolidate the IT resource management and monitoring of their heterogeneous environment – including servers, switches, routers, and printers. “A key factor in our decision to use Redcell was its ability to monitor all of our data network devices and servers from one platform,” says Juan Barrera, Internet Systems Manager at Weslaco ISD. “Redcell presents a single pane of glass of the datacenter and provides our administrators the power and flexibility to manage it with a customizable permission-based graphical user interface (GUI).” Dorado Software’s enterprise products: Redcell Management Essentials, Redcell Inventory Manager, and Redcell Change Manager, provide Weslaco with a single unified view for health monitoring, compliance identification & auditing, troubleshooting, and software patching of their multi-vendor network, server, and printer environment which includes equipment from Cisco, Dell, and others. Some of the functions that Redcell provides are deep system discovery, inventory management and reporting, device configuration, health management, remote access and control, software patching & provisioning, topology views, and performance monitoring. To reduce errors and increase productivity, Weslaco will automate their manual configuration processes with Redcell’s Group Operations (which has one-to-many capabilities). Examples include: automating inventory and change reporting; applying configuration and security changes to groups of systems, updating switch/router OS/Firmware and server OS/driver patches, managing passwords, and many other operations. Weslaco Independent School District, located in South Central Hidalgo County in Texas, serves a population of nearly 16,439 students with 17 high, middle and elementary schools. With an operating budget of $145 million and about 2,430 employees, WISD is one of the largest employers in the city of Weslaco. For more information, please visit http://www.wisd.us/ Midlothian Independent School District, Texas Although enrollment growth has moderated from previous levels, it is expected that enrollment will accelerate again within the next few years due to the availability of reasonably priced land for residential development and the construction of transportation links that facilitate access to the broad Dallas-Fort Worth economy. The district has experienced and projects further operating and capital pressures arising from ongoing enrollment growth. However, current financial performance and expected tax base growth suggest the district will be able to maintain its sound financial profile over the near term. Approximately 25 miles to the south of Dallas and Fort Worth, Midlothian ISD is located in northwest Ellis County. Encompassing 113 square miles, it serves primarily the city of Midlothian. The economic base of the district is shifting away from an agricultural and manufacturing basis towards that of a more residential nature. The city of Midlothian's population has almost doubled since 2000 to an estimated 14,452 residents in 2006. However, despite ongoing population growth, estimates indicate that only 25% of the district is currently built-out. Enrollment is currently at around 6,800 students, having grown at a healthy annual average of roughly 6.1% since fiscal 2003, although district officials report enrollment projections have been scaled back from original estimates for fiscal 2008 and over the next few years due to a recent slowdown in homebuilding activity. The district continues to maintain marked improvement in its more recent financial performance. General fund balances increased from 7% of expenditures and other uses in fiscal 2003 to another solid 24.1% in fiscal 2007. These gains were aided by a change in the district's fiscal year-end from Aug. 31 to June 30 in fiscal 2004. Audited fiscal 2007 results came in on target from earlier projections with the addition of $1.2 million to the general fund balance, increasing the total to $12 million. Unreserved, undesignated general fund balances have remained relatively stable over the past few years and equaled 8.5% for fiscal 2007. This reflects the district's continued efforts since fiscal 2004 to address various capital needs and reserve a sizable portion of its fund balance for construction purposes. For fiscal 2007, these moneys amounted to almost $6.6 million or 13.1% of expenditures and other uses. The district maintains additional financial flexibility with its 10% optional homestead exemption. Midlothian ISD is the only district in Ellis County offering this additional local exemption. However, reducing or eliminating this exemption could prove politically difficult. Direct and overall debt ratios are high, and although the exact size of the next bond program has not yet been determined, Fitch believes the district's future capital needs will continue to pressure debt ratios. However, the district participates in a tax increment reinvestment zone (TIRZ), whereby debt service taxes are levied against TIRZ properties that lower debt levels somewhat. Due to sizable cement, steel, and electric power producers in and around the TIRZ, taxpayer concentration is high, although the level of concentration has been declining slightly each year as additional residential and commercial development comes on line within the district. In fiscal 2008, the top 10 taxpayers represent almost 28% of the district's TAV; these same taxpayers, including their values within the TIRZ, represent not quite 40% of the district's TAV. Debt is amortized slowly at 22% of principal repaid in 10 years, reflecting the extended amortization schedule and the use of capital appreciation bonds to minimize tax rate impacts and shift debt burden to future taxpayers. The district no longer receives state support for its debt service as in prior years. The current offering will be used to construct an agricultural science facility, which was the sole proposition approved in the district's most recent bond election. The majority of the district's requested authorization on the November 2007 ballot was for the construction of a second high school. The district may seek additional bond authorization in 2008, as it has no remaining authorized but unissued debt at this time. Crandall Independent School District, Texas The district is located in Kaufman County, approximately 25 miles southeast of Dallas. Due to ample and inexpensive land and its proximity to the Dallas-Ft. Worth metroplex, the county's population grew by 31% in 2000-2006 to over 92,000. The Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex area unemployment rate declined to 3.8% as of October 2007, significantly lower than in years following the technology bust (6.4% in 2002 and 6.7% in 2003). County wealth levels remain above state and national averages. The district is experiencing a sizable increase in population, student enrollment, and taxable assessed value (TAV) due to the development of numerous master-planned residential communities. The largest development project, known as Heartland, totals 2,500 acres just outside the City of Crandall and will be comprised of 8,000 residential units. The development is currently in Phase 1 out of a total eight planned phases and already contains 500 occupied homes, helping boost enrollment growth to 14% in fiscal 2008. Heartland has donated seven school sites to the district and signed a developer agreement that provides infrastructure assistance for future school construction, which reduces capital requirements of the district. As a result of this project and numerous other developments, TAV surged by 27% in fiscal 2008, most of which was due to new construction. With 13 subdivisions in various stages of development, a total of 21,000 homes are planned within the district. In response to the projected surge in future enrollment, voters approved a $50 million authorization in November 2007 for the construction of two new schools, building renovations, and technology upgrades. At $20 million, the current offering represents a large 75% increase in the district's GO debt levels, doubling direct debt levels to a high $3,827 per capita and 8% of TAV, after adjusting for 38% state support. Overall debt levels are also high at $4,345 per capita and 9.1% of TAV. Principal amortization is also slow. Issuance of the remaining $30 million authorization for another school will take place in three to five years, but is dependent on sustained enrollment gains. The district's trend of solid financial reserves was maintained in fiscal 2007 as evidenced by a $1.4 million general fund surplus. Including an $800,000 reserve for operations, its fund balance cushion totaled $3.7 million or 27% of spending in fiscal 2007. The fiscal 2008 budget is balanced despite awarding a 5.2% teacher pay raise. Notably, the budgeted enrollment growth of 6% was surpassed considerably by an actual rate of 14%, resulting in additional state funding which accounts for approximately 57% of total revenues. |
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