About a year ago, Rich Williams became president of the Thomas Jefferson High School Alumni Association, at which time he tried to corral his counterparts ’round town for a little brainstorming session. The reason being, Williams says, the TJ group had started strong some five years back but began to…
Newsweek has yet again released its list of the top 1,500 public high schools in the U.S. — and Dallas, with six on the list, has dropped one from the ’08 scorecard: poor ol’ Hillcrest High School, which last year came in at No. 547, dang. The School for the…
The missus and I got a call yesterday from Dallas Independent School District Superintendent Michael Hinojosa, thanking us for keeping the kid in the district for a whole school year: “Thank you for entrusting your students to us and keeping the focus on academic achievement this school year,” said the…
At a little over 4,000 characters, this story from U.S. News & World Report is running our attention spans ragged — but we think what they’re doing today is throwing a national spotlight on two University of Texas at Dallas professors who’ve harnessed the awesome power of Twitter in their…
A Friend of Unfair Park who attended Woodrow Wilson High School way back when sends word that the school’s 80th anniversary celebration, which we chronicled at the end of April, is now a DVD two-fer selling here for the low, low price of $25. Far as my Hillcrest High School-graduating…
The Dallas County Community College District board meets tomorrow at 4 p.m. at 1601 S. Lamar Street, and the confab should be livelier than most. In our in-box this morning, we were among those who received an invite to “Stand in Solidarity for Carla Ranger,” the Dallas Independent School District…
Based on preliminary calculations and TAKS results, a record number of Dallas Independent School District campuses are poised to be classified as “recognized” or “exemplary” by the Texas Education Agency. Until now, not one non-magnet high school in the district has been deemed recognized, and this year six are slated…
I’ve given up trying to get answers from Dallas County Community College District officials concerning the firing of Dallas Independent School District trustee Carla Ranger last week; all we have to go on is this letter from DCCCD Associate Vice Chancellor of Student Affairs W.G. Garland, which Ranger posted to…
Still no word from Dallas County Community College District officials concerning their decision to terminate Carla Ranger’s contract, thus ending her 20-year tenure with DCCCD. But late last night, the Dallas Independent School District board trustee did post to her blog her short-and-sweet termination letter, which, she writes, was hand-delivered…
On Monday, Tawnell Hobbs posted a poll in which she asked readers of The News’s Dallas ISD Blog, “Who should be the next DISD board prez?” Perhaps not surprisingly, the outspoken Carla Ranger — who led the charge to overturn the board’s decision not to hold 2009 elections, and who…
I’ve left a message for Wright Lassiter, chancellor of the Dallas County Community College District; he is at a meeting and not expected to return till later today. I’ve called the law offices of Jerry Prater, chair of DCCCD’s board of trustees; he is out of the office and not…
View Larger MapEarlier this month, Alexa was in West Dallas for the tearing-down of several problematic properties courtesy nonprofits promising safe, affordable housing in coming months. Among those in attendance was Mayor Tom Leppert, who said, “We are very interested in rebuilding and revitalizing [West Dallas]. This investment is going…
The headline says it all. But this missive, which we just received from Congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson’s office concerning the fight over funding at Dallas Independent School District’s magnet schools and learning centers, says it better. Certainly, longer.Update at 5:15 p.m.: As the DISD board of trustees is due to…
Big weekend planned on the SMU campus, where Laura Bush will deliver the commencement address Saturday morning at Moody Coliseum to the some 2,000 Mustangs escaping the Hilltop. But in advance of the weekend shindig, there are tomorrow’s honorary degree recipients symposia featuring some fairly bold-faced names: Harold W. Attridge,…
Tonight, of course, is the Dallas Independent School District board of trustees’ called board meeting, at which the board will discuss and approve campus staffing formulas for the 2009-’10 school year; Schutze is attending, but of course. But at this very moment is the lengthy warm-up: a regular ol’ board…
Late into last night, there erupted at the bottom of Schutze’s Tuesday post — concerning the Dallas Independent School District board’s threat to needlessly gut the magnets and learning centers — a discussion about “commitments and covenants.” Those are what the district adopted in ’03 to get out from under…
Observer theater critic and Theater Jones’ing Elaine Liner passes along this photo, taken yesterday at the school where I spent a thousand Saturdays playing soccer as a kid. But, c’mon, that is how you pronounce it, no?…
As of this afternoon, we’ve got 50-plus good reasons why we run comments on Unfair Park. They’re affixed to Jim’s Friday-evening item concerning the potential fate of DISD’s magnet schools and learning centers. Jim and I marveled throughout the weekend at the quantity and quality of the comments, many of…
When last we left the Dallas Independent School District board of trustees yesterday, they had come back from their closed-door meeting and presented two options to deal with the Texas Attorney General’s opinion concerning the extension of terms from three to four years: special elections or appointments to fill the…
Dallas Independent School District spokesman Jon Dahlander just called Unfair Park back to explain the figure on Page 14 of the summary of staffing formulas at DISD campuses for the 2009-’10 school year being discussed by trustees today. And while it looks as though the Booker T. Washington High School…
As I noted, earlier Jim’s at 3700 Ross Avenue, where, at this very moment, the board of trustees is behind closed doors, no doubt arguing over the ramifications of the Texas Attorney General’s opinion that the trustees should not have extended their terms from three years to four last November…
Last week, the Texas Attorney General’s Office offered its opinion that the Dallas Independent School District’s board of trustees “was not authorized to change the length of its members’ terms of office” from three to four years last November. Which has prompted a called board meeting at 3:30 p.m. tomorrow,…
