HISD: New schools, rules and college credits

12:32 PM CDT on Monday, August 15, 2005

By Reggie Aqui / 11 News

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Thousands of HISD students will start their classes in the largest public school system in Texas Monday.

More than 208,000 students were enrolled during the last school year. HISD is the seventh largest system in the United States.

KHOU-TV

Monday morning was the first day of school for HISD students.

The students attended 302 different schools, 206 of which were elementary schools.

Five new schools opened Monday morning as part of a $54 million expansion project.

One of those schools is so new that it doesn't even have its name on the building. It is Joe Moreno Elementary, named after the popular Texas lawmaker who died in a cart accident in May. He was on his way to Austin from Houston when he lost control of his car.

Another school opening Monday, Empowerment College Preparatory, will have a small student body. There are just 100 ninth graders who, for the first couple years, will basically follow the normal high school curriculum.

But by their junior and senior years they'll be earning college credit through courses at Houston Community College South.

Earning the college credits will be free to the students.

This year, high school and other principals could be called to the principal's office because HISD now has 19 executive principals. They are essentially "super principals" who will oversee various clusters of the school district.

HISD hopes this will help them perform better and have more accountability throughout the system.

Yates, Kashmere and Sam Houston high schools have also undergone some major changes in preparation for the new school year.

The state mandated that the schools take action because students had failed to perform well a couple of years in a row.

The principals of the three schools made the teachers reapply for their jobs. As a result, only about 50 percent of the teachers were asked to return this year.

As an incentive, the teachers can get a $3,000 bonus if the students improve their TAKS test scores from last year.