As the Taylor Independent School District readies for the November bond election, Superintendent Devin Padavil is also focused on improving the district’s accountability rating for the 2022-23 school year.
At the Sept. 19 meeting of the Board of Trustees, Padavil stressed the importance of accurately reflecting the number of students who are receiving free and reduced lunches as a way of improving the overall score to a group of Taylor ISD school principals in attendance.
Earlier this year, Taylor ISD received disappointing news from Texas Education Agency when they released their accountability ratings for 202122 school year. While Thrall Independent School District earned an A, Granger and Hutto school districts both earned a B rating, and Taylor Independent School District received a C, the lowest grade possible to still receive a rating.
“If you have ever seen a sporting event, like a championship game, and with the opposing team, you will see a player in the dugout just watching the other team celebrate,” Padavil said. “I will tell you as superintendent, that’s how I felt, knowing that this district is capable of improving student outcomes. So, we are getting very focused on what is necessary to do that.”
In addition to looking at factors like employee morale and classroom goals, Padavil stressed the need to look closely at the number of students enrolled in free and reduced lunches.
“I am going to do a little bit of an autopsy for you,” Padavil said. “If I haven’t gone through this with you trustees and principals, when we look back what led to it, one of the biggest factors that led to it was the percentage of students who qualified for free and reduced lunch.”
At the meeting, Padavil revealed that the district is currently sitting at around 66 percent of students qualifying, and that they have until the end of October to get their applications in, while last year at this time, the district was only at around 45 percent for free and reduced lunch take up.
“Why do I bring this up right now?” asked Padavil. “The state of Texas curves our scores based on the percentage of students that qualify for free and reduced lunch. So, the failure of our leadership to make sure that every student possible was signing up for free and reduced lunch actually hurt us as a district in terms of how our score came out.”
Padavil said improving the score for this year was a priority for the district.
“Every week we are going to meet as a leadership team, asking the question of where are we and what are we doing to improve the percentage,” Padavil said. “It is critical, not only for kids and families, but it is critical for our school district performance that that percentage is accurate.”
