The
AISD Board of Trustees on Monday tackled two quite controversial issues: the district’s “new”
grading policy, and site acquisition for new schools south of the river.
AISD Superintendent Jim Fox gave the nod last month to some members of his
inner circle, including Deputy Superintendent Kay Psencik, who abruptly
implemented an interesting new regulation: No student in middle or high school
was to receive a six weeks’ grade lower than 50, no matter what. In direct
opposition to current management theories, this decision was handed down
without giving stakeholders — namely, teachers — an opportunity to buy into
this new practice. And neither was any empirical evidence – numbers, anyone? —
furnished as a rationale.
Board members, however, pointed out that this was not an administrative
regulation that AISD staff could undertake on its own. As a matter of fact, the
district has a grading policy. And adopting policy is the board’s job, not
staff’s, trustees said. Reading from a prepared statement, trustee Liz Hartman
said, “Policy development and adoption should not be a process that fosters
isolation and exclusion of the important stakeholders. I believe (in including)
people from the beginning so that we do not have to continually react to
decisions that (people don’t understand).” She asked that the issue be placed
as an action item on an upcoming agenda.
For their part, Fox, Psencik, and associate superintendent Darlene Westbrook
were at pains to backtrack and admit that they had indeed erred in their
judgment. Psencik and Westbrook said they are going to hold a meeting at every
AISD high school to discuss the grading policy. “Wear your flak jacket,”
advised board president Kathy Rider.
The board also heard an information item from deputy superintendent A.C.
Gonzalez, who is responsible for managing the district’s $369 million bond
program, on the movement to acquire land for new schools, often termed “relief”
schools, somewhere in South Austin. But trustees Ted Whatley and Geoff Rips
criticized the presentation as incomplete, and requested much more information
from Gonzalez — including maps that show where the contributing and recharge
zones of the Edwards Aquifer fall in AISD, as well as where the city’s
Preferred Growth Corridor lies within AISD’s boundaries.
Reading from a memorandum written by Edwards Aquifer Conservation District
trustee Sue Johnson, Rips also promoted the notion that secondary schools, most
especially, should be sited in a fashion designed to draw population in toward
the city center rather than outward toward the suburban fringes. To accomplish
this goal, Rips suggested, the district would need to reconfigure current
attendance boundaries in Southwest AISD. But that’s always a most thorny
matter, and a subject around which AISD staff is steering clear at the moment.
Board discussion first revolved around whether Rips and Whatley should be
piling on more work for Gonzalez (which was trustee Tom Agnor’s point of view),
but true to form, Hartman pointed out the board has no policy limiting the
amount of information board members may request. But the quality of
information is also at stake; look for many more battles like this in the weeks
and months ahead. In the meantime, the bond program barrels on and AISD will
proceed with scoping out parcels of land in Southwest Austin.
This article appears in February 28 • 1997 and February 28 • 1997 (Cover).