New A-F ratings put Fort Worth ISD at risk of state takeover. What does it mean?
When Texas education officials released long-delayed 2023 A-F accountability scores last week, the Fort Worth Independent School District found itself at risk for a possible state takeover like the one that occurred two years ago in the state’s largest school district.
After a now-closed sixth grade center in the district received a failure rating for five consecutive years, Fort Worth ISD is facing the possibility of state intervention. But the specifics of the situation make it difficult to predict what that intervention looks like — and even whether it happens at all.
Texas A-F ratings put FWISD at risk of state takeover
When a school receives a failure rating for five consecutive years, state law requires the education commissioner to do one of two things: Shut that campus down, or take over the entire district, replacing its elected school board with a state-appointed board of managers made up of district residents. The commissioner may also replace the superintendent, but isn’t required to do so.
Because of a change in state law, TEA didn’t issue failure ratings in 2021 and 2022. But that change was a pause, not a reset. That means any campus that racked up four consecutive failure ratings between 2016-2019 and then received an F in 2023’s ratings could place its district at risk of state takeover. Across Texas, there’s only one campus in that situation: Fort Worth ISD’s Leadership Academy at Forest Oak Sixth Grade, formerly known as Glencrest Sixth Grade.
Complicating matters is the fact that Fort Worth ISD has already closed Forest Oak Sixth Grade. After the sixth grade center lost about a quarter of its enrollment between 2019 and 2022, the district shut the campus down at the beginning of the current school year and consolidated it with the Leadership Academy at Forest Oak Middle School, about a mile away. It’s unclear if the district’s closure of its own campus satisfies the law requiring Texas Education Commissioner Mike Morath to intervene or, if not, what action the commissioner would take. TEA officials have noted that the ratings are considered preliminary until they’re finalized in August, and every district has the opportunity to appeal.
In a letter to Fort Worth ISD families last week, Superintendent Karen Molinar emphasized that the ratings released Thursday don’t account for the district’s progress since 2023 and the work district and city leaders have done around the issue of literacy. The district improved from a D in the 2023 ratings to a C in the unofficial ratings for 2024.
The district is already making “bold and urgent” plans for the upcoming school year, Molinar said, including boosting phonics instruction in early grades, creating more reading and math instructional time and adding resources for students with dyslexia.
TEA takes over Houston, South San Antonio ISDs
TEA has taken over a handful of school districts over the past five years, notably Houston ISD and South San Antonio ISD. In Houston, Phillis Wheatley High School received a fifth consecutive failure rating in 2019, prompting the state to step in. But a court injunction blocked the takeover until 2023. By that time, the school’s rating had improved, but state education officials said the law still required them to take action. In South San Antonio, state education officials said years of dysfunction and poor governance had resulted in poor student performance and public distrust. In both cases, Morath appointed new district superintendents.
When TEA takes over a school district, it replaces its elected school board with a board of managers made up of members appointed from within the district. That board stays in place for two years. At the end of that period, the commissioner decides whether to begin phasing elected board members back onto the board, or leave the state-appointed board in place for two more years.
In Houston ISD, state officials have said the state takeover will end when no campuses have consecutive years of unacceptable ratings, district governance improves and the district is in compliance with state and federal special education laws. One campus in Houston ISD — Highland Heights Elementary School — had posted four straight years of failure ratings as of 2023. But the campus improved to a B in the district’s unofficial ratings for 2024. The district will be under state intervention at least until June 2027.
