After a two-year pause due to COVID, the Texas Education Agency released its accountability ratings for Texas school districts for the 2021-22 school year Aug. 15, and the results couldn’t be more different for our local area. Thrall Independent School District has earned an A, while Taylor Independent School District received a C, the lowest grade possible to still receive a rating.
Thrall Superintendent Tommy Hooker said in a statement that he was “elated” by the overall score of 96 for his district.
“This was one of the highest scores in the state,” he said. “This was in part due to the continued success at the campuses of Thrall Middle School and Thrall High School, who were A campuses as of the last ratings by the TEA in 2019. Our Thrall Elementary made huge strides as they improved to the score of 87, which is a great score for elementary school campuses within the state … We will now turn our focus on gaining a perfect score for the next cycles as we have the students, teams of teachers and administrators, and an overwhelmingly supportive school board.”
For Taylor ISD, the reaction was more somber, but also focused on improvement in years to come.
“We showed growth from the previous year, but it is not enough growth based on what we would expect,” said Superintendent Devin Padavil. “We are confident that in the work that is taking place we have created a curriculum for our teachers, we have brand new campus leaders who are focused on academics, and improving academics and we believe all these steps are going to lead to positive results in the next school year.”
According to the TEA, the A-F rating system was established by House Bill 22 in the 85th Texas Legislature to offer parents, educators and other stakeholders a “transparent view of academic performance.” This year, 1,195 school districts were measured in three categories: Student Achievement, School Progress and Closing the Gaps. Within these broad categories, STAAR performance test results, graduation rates, academic growth and other factors were examined.
While Taylor ISD received a scaled score of 90 in its graduation rate and college, career and military readiness, its scaled score for academic growth was 59, which is not rated because it fell below the C rating.
Padavil said that while Taylor ISD showed growth in reading, student test scores in math are still an area that needs to improve. One reason for the shortfall came from staffing shortages in previous school years, he said.
“Our biggest growth need is going to be math,” he said. “Math performance just did not look as strong as it need to.” However, Padavil said measures have been put in place to bring the district to a higher score next year.
“Every math teacher, especially those new to the district is going to have a mentor and we are going to be working very closely and intensely with our math students to make sure that we are monitoring and improving their progress over the course of the year. I think the most important thing to understand is that while we saw growth it’s not to the level we know our students are capable of. It takes strong leadership at the schools, strong parent involvement and it takes a district that is focused on learning.”
