[Texas] Minority students become majority

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[I lived in San Angelo for about 15 months, 1967-1968. It seemed heavily white when I lived there. The Mexican section was quite small, with a beautiful adobe church, could have been an old mission, I can't remember. The black section wasn't much bigger, as I recall, could even have been smaller.]

Sunday, September 15, 2002

SAISD student population swells to more than 50 percent racial minorities

GRETCHEN M. WINTERMANTEL Staff Writer

Minority students are no longer the minority in the San Angelo Independent School District.

More than half of SAISD students are either Hispanic or black, following the trend across the state. Minority students are the majority in more than half of the district’s elementary schools.

According to the Texas Education Agency’s Academic Excellence Indicator System, in 2000-2001, minorities comprised 51.9 percent of SAISD students and 64 percent of Texas students. Whites comprised 46.8 percent of the SAISD population and 42 percent of the state population.

Asian/Pacific Islanders and Native Americans make up the remaining students.

Superintendent Cole Pugh said his best guess is that minority enrollment will continue to increase.

The school board hired Harner and Associates at its Aug. 6 meeting to begin a demographic study and present its initial findings in December. The firm will develop district-wide projections for the next 10 years as well as enrollment projections by school for the next five years.

Pugh said the information will help when the administration is looking at facility upgrades, personnel cuts and school closures.

Trustee Joe Muñoz represents District 2, which has a 51.58 percent Hispanic, 5.69 percent black and 40.78 percent white population.

Muñoz said he always hears that the school district’s workforce should reflect its student population, but that is not the case in the SAISD.

It is not for lack of trying, however, Muñoz said.

Gloria Baird, executive director of personnel, said the district encourages all paraprofessionals (teachers’ aides, secretaries and clerical workers) to take college courses “in an attempt to have more minority teachers.”

Baird said a Bilingual Education Grant pays for paraprofessionals at Reagan and San Jacinto, the SAISD’s bilingual schools, to take courses.

Davis Edwards is a volunteer with the district to recruit minorities. The school district pays his expenses when he goes to East Texas Baptist University, Jarvis Christian College, Prairie View A&M University and Wiley College, Baird said.

Baird and personnel director Eddie Salcido go to other recruiting sites, including Angelo State, Southwest Texas State, Sul Ross, Texas Tech and West Texas A&M universities.

“Part of it is that every district is trying to recruit minority teachers,” Muñoz said. “It’s more difficult to get minority teachers from outside San Angelo to teach here.”

One benefit of having minority teachers, Muñoz said, is that students see success in people of their own ethnicity.

Muñoz also said minority teachers are generally better able to relate to Hispanic students. “It’s a very general statement, and there are certainly many exceptions in San Angelo, but they seem to have a better understanding of their total culture and their total needs,” Muñoz said. “The majority of minority teachers come from similar backgrounds.”

Trustee Daniel Cardenas represents District 6, which has a 62.2 percent Hispanic, 6.98 black and 29.38 percent white population.

He said he always favored having a diverse workforce and agrees that having minorities in teaching and administrative positions can help inspire minority students. “I think it would encourage them to strive for their goals in education.’’

Cardenas added that the district can do more to recruit minority educators. “I think a lot of times we talk about recruiting minorities, but it is just talk.’’

The district hires consultants to help with all kinds of issues and should consider hiring a company that specializes in minority recruitment, Cardenas suggested.

“A lot of times (job candidates) won’t come to you, you’ve got to go seek them,’’ he said. “Our new high school principals didn’t come seeking a job here; we went and sought them. When you reach out, you can find people.’’

Joanne Rice, assistant superintendent for education support services, said teachers will undergo a curriculum audit over the next two months using information from Just for the Kids, a group that compiled a study of Texas schools last year.

Just for the Kids ranks schools by their Texas Assessment of Academic Skills test scores and measures opportunity gaps. An opportunity gap is how well a school performs compared to how well other schools with similar student populations perform.

“We’re going to look at closing the gaps,” Rice said. Principals and teachers will use the Just for the Kids study to learn best practices of the schools that have high success rates and then follow their strategies. Rice said all SAISD schools have been authorized to send staff members to the top school in their grouping.

A school with a high number of economically disadvantaged students would be grouped with the top 10 schools with the same or higher number of students on free or reduced lunch.

Economically disadvantaged does not necessarily mean minority students, and it does not mean that the school does not score well, Rice added. For example, Belaire and Austin elementary schools have high majority Hispanic and black populations and consistently perform well on the TAAS test.

San Angelo schools with majority minority populations are: Lake View High School, Carver Learning Center, Edison Junior High, Lincoln Junior High, Alta Loma, Austin, Belaire, Blackshear, Bradford, Fannin, Fort Concho, Reagan, Rio Vista and San Jacinto.

Goliad and Holiman, which are often thought of as minority schools, have majority white populations.

Day Elementary, which closed after school ended last May, had a majority Hispanic population.

When school officials announced school closures last year, many San Angeloans suspected the district had a list of schools that included Rio Vista and Blackshear, both majority Hispanic schools.

Rice said she doesn’t know why these schools are always mentioned.

The Facilities Task Force that Pugh formed in August will make recommendations about school closures.

“You have to decide what parameters you’re going to look at,” Rice said. “You could look at the cost of the school, the test scores, the age of the facility, busing costs. There are a number of things you can look at.”

Until the task force does that, she said, the school district cannot determine which schools to close.

The task force “needs to set parameters and then apply them to every campus and be true to them,” Rice added.

-- Anonymous, September 15, 2002


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