Chapter 27 — Public hearing on turnaround plans, November 20, 2025

**Source:** `meetings/clean/20251121-Austin-ISD-Board-of-Trustees-Public-Hearing--November-20-2025.txt` **Clock:** Called to order **[00:00:15]** Thursday, November 20, 2025 at **5:01 p.m.** Adjourned **[02:31:52] at 7:32 p.m.** Then a short break and the regular voting meeting (Chapter 28). **Room:** Board of Trustees, AISD central office. Trustee Gonzalez on Zoom. Hearing is TAP-only; other items wait for the voting meeting. **Four in-person speakers, six recorded.** One minute each. **Caption noise:** Segura / Sigur / Sagura; Widen = Weedane / Wedane / Widane; Winn = when / Win Montasauri; Barrington = Bington; Bedichek = Betachch; Pecan Springs = Pan Springs.

This is the legally required hearing before TAP submission. Speakers are mostly Widen restart vs. close. Staff then repeats the six TEA strategies, the 1882 pause, Burnet/Webb/Doby as year-five campuses, and the campus list. Trustee questions fill more than an hour: TEA will not give more time; TEA success criteria vs. sending students to D campuses; 850 special-education moves; class-size ratios that are “not a legal requirement”; whether a restart at Widen would even keep the teachers families love.

Call and rules — [00:00:15]–[00:02:21]

Boswell: Chapter 551; quorum physically present; cable 22 / AT&T 99. Hearing comment is **turnaround plans only**; other items after the hearing. Four in person: Amber Welsh, Relle Olivar/Olivas, Jason Rodriguez, Senovio Santander. Six recorded.

In-person — [00:02:33]–[00:07:31]

**Amber Welsh [00:02:33].** Parent at a TAP campus. District group “presented three options, but we only received more information… after they had decided that close[d] reassign was best.” Still cannot find which options were considered or why. “Communicating with district staff related to TAPs has been nearly impossible.” Yellow light. “Please communicate with us better. We want to work with you.”

**Relle Olivar [00:03:50].** Parent of a third grader at Widen. “The vote that you are making tonight will change the landscape for 50 years.” Each closure-reassign TAP “deserve[s] an individual vote.” TAPs are “district-led… district written.” Community “allowed to comment but not vote… review but not edit.” Tonight “you will be presented with a community-led plan that calls for a restart of Widen Elementary.” “Closure to Widen would desecrate the decades-long partnership… a nationally recognized model in southeast Austin.”

**Jason Rodriguez, Widen [00:05:08].** “An amendment for a restart and not a closure.” Closing is “ripping our hearts out.” Keep the building even under another name. “What’s with the 50-year plan? What about now?” Parents and faculty are “vital assets.”

**Senovio Santander (Center) [00:06:29].** Second grader and fifth grader at Widen. “Stop, look, and listen. Plan A should always be… the community plan.” Restart. “Y’all have left the Latino community out for a long period of time.”

Recorded — [00:07:36]–[00:13:58]

**Nikki [00:07:49].** Thanksgiving thanks to TAP principals: “The cavalry finally came… and is trampling right over you.” AISD “showed up too late.” Principals “aren’t the cause of your school’s closing.” Thanks trustees for “rightsizing.” Thanks Sunset Valley, Ridgetop, Riley families for bilingual continuation. Thanks TAP teachers (pay/respect). File cuts; a later fragment: **“Delay the vote on closures, consolidations, and program changes.”** Dobie, Burnet, Webb “that harm still echoes.” “Hard things are investing in our school communities… trimming administrative excess… implementing TAPs two and a half years ago” so the district would not be “one step from TEA takeover.” “We were promised cuts away from campuses first. We got performative cuts, increased spending, fast-track school closures built largely by two people now on leave.”

**Ann Teich [00:10:04].** Former trustee 2012–2020; retired AISD educator 34 years. **Agenda 3.1: approve the plans.** “AISD’s core mission is to educate students.” Resources “take precedence over the agendas of some adults.” Do not do “the bidding of a small group of local constituents who either do not understand or respect the overall burden… because of state action or inaction.” Congratulates superintendent and trustees for a “bold step” toward equity. “Peace out.”

**Patrick Bettis, Widen parent [00:11:14].** Restart, don’t close. “Make the investments into these schools that they’ve needed for a while.”

**Rachel Bettis [00:11:42].** Parent of a special-education student at Widen. Principal knows her son by name. Neurodivergence: “as little amount of change as possible.” They walk to school. “We would love to see Widen remain open and that building remain open… for a restart.”

**Carol Regelin [00:12:46].** Doctorate in OT; adjunct at ACC Eastview. Keep **Oak Springs**: equity, ACC / early-college hub, students walk, no transportation to another campus, millions already invested, fully staffed this year including interventionists, “nearly met the standard this year.” “Closing the school would not solve a problem. It would create deeper ones.”

Boswell: public testimony concluded **[00:13:58]**.

First trustee question: more time? — [00:14:09]–[00:16:04]

**Hunter to Segura [00:14:11].** “Would it be possible to take a school that has shown progress and ask for additional time?”

Segura: “I do not believe that would be possible for us to do.”

Hunter: possible for us, or TEA would not accept it?

Segura: “I do not believe TEA would accept it.”

Hunter: “I’m saddened.” Schools making incremental progress; “why our state would then say, no, we don’t want to give you more additional help.” Agrees with Whitley Chu that it is “punishment to not reward people when they are making those gains.” Specifically **Winn**, a Montessori school the community wants. The new plan “is doable” but needs “a lot of work… to transition this community into its new community” and “a commitment to this work to do what we said we were going to do.”

No other clarification. Email: trustees@austinisd.org. More comment at the voting meeting.

Staff presentation — [00:16:26]–[00:47:22]

Segura introduces Dr. Latanya Emerson (school improvement), Jennifer Pace (elementary leadership), Dr. Angel Wilson (secondary), Dr. Maryanne Maxwell (academics), Brandy Hosek (talent). Concurrent work: TAPs “in compliance with Texas Education Agency requirements,” plus “budget deficits, program realignments, the ever shifting accountability system.”

TAP definition repeated: two unacceptable counts (three consecutive D’s, or F’s); counts back to 2018–19; implement in year three; two years to break the chain before year five. Plans that will not be accepted cannot be submitted; rejection risks “further escalation via state intervention up to installation of a board of managers.”

Six strategies again. Dobie / Burnet / Webb = district-managed restart. Mendez = partner-managed. Closure/reassign to a C or better; TAP assigned to the receiving school. New school must be new scope. At 3 UA, school improvement “unlikely.” Fifth UA: commissioner **shall** close or install a board of managers — “often referred to as a… state takeover.” **Burnet, Webb, and Dobie are currently in their fifth year [00:22:03].**

**1882 contingency [00:22:27].** Partner with demonstrated F-to-C (or better) restart; two-year pause; fifth year can become year one of the pause. Board stated that ability June 26 for Burnet/Webb/Dobie. Not written into every TAP: if a receiving campus (example: **Bedichek TAP assigned to Covington**, which has no UA) carried 1882 language, it would scare staff. Ability exists “regardless if it’s in the plan or not.”

History: chains to 2018–19. ~A dozen schools B to F when STAAR changed 2022–23. 2024–25: more A’s, fewer F’s; he expects F’s down “significantly” this year.

**Emerson [00:25:56].** Lessons from Dobie / Webb / Burnet: HQIM, leadership coaching, PD, strategic staffing, early recruitment, vacancy management, data trackers. Opportunities: planning, staffing, student supports; MTSS; family engagement (dual-capacity, adult ESL, enrollment assistance, wraparound); revised master schedule; expanded electives and interventions; lighthouse; targeted PD. **Middle-school restart schedule:** four-period day to five-period; 90-minute periods to ~70; more weekly minutes; **450 minutes/week ELA and math, 270 science and social studies**; one extended day per week; summer school. Family engagement: Karen Mapp dual-capacity framework.

**Maxwell [00:29:30].** Evaluation table: quantitative left, qualitative right. MAP (BOY/MOY), STAAR interim, curriculum-based assessments, student writing on common rubrics, campus assessments/data trackers, district walkthroughs plus technical-partner walkthroughs, PLCs. MOY MAP projected proficiency **~84–88%** accurate for STAAR, “a little bit more reliable even than the STAAR interim.” MTSS / campus study teams; individualized plans.

**Pace [00:34:44].** Seven closure/reassign: Barrington, Bedichek, Dawson, Oak Springs, Martin, **Winn Montessori, Widen**. Five ACE restarts: Linder, Sanchez, Paredes, Pecan Springs, Wooldridge. Twelve school-improvement: TA Brown, Govalle, Hart, Houston, Jordan, Norman, Sims, Overton, Padron, Pickle, Sadler Means, Wooten, Eastside ECHS (federal CSI label). Strategy chosen for TEA acceptance, enrollment, facilities, proximity, multi-year trends.

Receiving map **[00:36:40]:** Dawson→Galindo; Oak Springs→Blackshear; majority Barrington→Guerrero Thompson; majority Bedichek→Covington; majority Martin→Keeling. **Widen→Rodriguez (currently D, B the previous year).** Majority Winn→**Andrews (D)**; smaller share to Pecan Springs (3 UA restart). Smaller Bedichek share to Paredes (3 UA). Smaller Martin share to Marshall (D). Where students go to a restart or D, “keep the number… manageable.” Extra resources at restart and D receivers.

**Hosek [00:38:46].** 2 UA school improvement: additional staffing allotment, principal discretion. Restarts/reassigns: same plus “professional incentives” (not a stipend — goals attached, paid on achievement), supplemental hours, family supports, discretionary funds. **About $1 million per restart/reassign campus; ~$350,000 per school-improvement campus.** Timeline: tonight’s vote; tomorrow a **preliminary preference survey to all staff districtwide**; December, superintendent selects TAP principals; January **hiring freeze** (including central office) so campus staff can move first; spring match fairs; **external hiring not until April**.

CDA targets: focus domain **2A growth** to a C. Two-year TAP. Eastside ECHS: D, federal CSI (bottom 5% statewide); C target.

Segura close **[00:45:45]:** “state intervention risk”; fewer F schools, more A schools; “the system is responding.”

Trustee questions — [00:47:22]–[02:31:21]

Hunter — parents, money that “looks big” — [00:47:38]–[00:53:45]

One nine-weeks in; BOY MAP yes; no STAAR interim; about three district benchmarks. “How many parents understand how well or how not well their students are doing?” Pace: MAP reports, progress reports, a new secondary parent-conference day. Hunter wants attendance percentage for those conferences. “That’s how we got here.” A 50% on an assignment is not 50% of the work. Light bill, gas bill, a packet they don’t read. Dual-capacity: send two books home. “The campus, they are at capacity, man… making phone calls at night on your way home.” Hosek slide: “I’m worried about $300 and I’m over here talking about $5 million… A million dollars… That’s like a $300 light bill and you say, girl, I got 10.” Older residents “very frustrated about those numbers”; she had to explain “that’s nothing.” “We’re not even compensating people for what they’re worth.” Ask what it would really take vs. what we have.

Hunter is speaking from classrooms and kitchen tables. The million-dollar TAP line is not recapture and not the allotment.

Singh — TEA success criteria, Widen and Winn to D’s — [00:53:45]–[01:12:06]

TAPs exist so the district invests; “the other side of it it’s not really just up to us right TEA approves these plans.” **Widen and Winn:** closure/reassign to D campuses, against TEA written success criteria (A/B/C receiving school). “If I’m voting on this, I have to feel very very like 100% confident… they’re going to accept because this is displacing a lot of people.”

Segura: “I am not going to bring anything to the board… that I do not think will be accepted.” Criteria are guidance, not law; amended six–eight weeks ago from A/B only to add C. Weekly agency contact from the special-ed agreed-order relationship. Deputy commissioners at times. Comprehensive plan (TAPs + program moves + later boundaries) is what TEA looks at “as a whole.” Rodriguez was a B last year, has a D not a UA. Winn: minority to Pecan Springs (restart); Andrews a D, history and resources to be written into the TAP. Widen originally split Houston (F risk) and Rodriguez; they unsplit after community/trustee feedback. Palm would be farther. “Do we have anything in written form? … that is not how the agency typically works.” Happy to share dates.

Singh: MOY MAP ~80–85% correlation to STAAR. How are Dobie, Webb, Burnet doing vs. last year? Segura: those TAPs approved **June 26** — two-month runway, few staff left to hire. This round: seven–eight months. MAP itself changed; norms updated from pre-COVID (national performance declined); math most affected. Comparison BOY-to-BOY is “a little more difficult.” Deep dive promised December. Singh: “it sounds like the answer is probably no… if they were better you would have been like yes.” Maxwell: NWEA meetings this week to interpret the new norms. Singh will wait; community will expect the same tracking “for these 24 TAPs.”

**ARDs [01:07:48].** Dr. Cherry Lee: ARD required if a **centralized placement** is changing; families may request; annual ARDs already in the spring. **~850 special-education students reassigned** under TAPs; number may fluctuate. How many centralized? She will get the number; “likely around 10%… not a large number” — Singh: “less than 100 or 100.” Segura: “we are staffed up in a way to do this work that we’ve never been.”

De Urioste — IEP campus name — [01:12:08]–[01:15:07]

Non-centralized students: IEP still names the old campus. “Don’t you have to have an ARD to confirm the new placement?” Lee: ARD determines services, not location. De Urioste: that is how centralized placement comes up in the first place. Lee will work with legal and IT; she does not believe an ARD is required solely to change the campus name in the digital system. De Urioste: “I just have a concern on procedurally how we were going to do it.”

Quintana — class size at Rodriguez — [01:15:13]–[01:26:26]

“If a school is going to be closed and reassigned… there were should be no more than 20 students in each class… Is that true?” Segura: “It’s not a requirement.” Documents commit to changing student-teacher ratio for restart or 3 UA. Hosek, slide 9: currently staff K–4 at **1:24 with a waiver**; would try **1:20** at 3 UA; middle from **1:29 to 1:25**. Not legal.

Quintana does the math: Widen **342** + Rodriguez **345** = **687**. 27 classrooms × 20 = **540**. “So we’re not going to do the 1:20 ratio.” Hosek: keep it as low as space allows; if out of space, 1:21 or 1:22. Enrollment unknown for fall. Combined special-ed **92 + 83**. Segura: ~**74%** of AISD special-ed students are in general education; 1:10 is life-skills, not the merge. De Urioste: resource, SPS, life-skills each need rooms; combining might force two life-skills rooms the building cannot hold, then centralized placements “we don’t have any prediction of yet.” Staffing “in the spring.” Segura: utilization was dropped at the start of this process to protect those rooms; “without a vote… the detail you want, we’re just not yet able to provide.” Rodriguez “not too long ago was much much larger.” De Urioste: choice becomes move sped or raise gen-ed cap. Segura: they looked at splitting Widen; community and trustees said don’t split and don’t send to an F (Houston, even though modernized). “Now we’re going to a school that wholly can fit.”

**Class size is on this night.** It is TAP implementation math, not a motion, not 22:1 statute, not a cut. Quintana is counting classrooms. Segura is counting surplus seats and TEA.

Kaufman — southeast projections; what if the board rejects one closure — [01:26:34]–[01:39:20]

Demographer projections for southeast? Segura: decline in the entire area; surplus “a significant number of seats”; Palm had even been proposed for closure until the timeline change. Widen community alternative: new apartments, a nearby charter closing. Segura: demographer met developers with certainty; student yield often smaller than communities expect; “over a thousand… empty seats in this area.”

If the board accepts some closures and rejects one or two? **“Over 20,000 empty seats. We have a deficit budget that continues to grow.”** Convert reassignment to restart: invest in a restart, “one less closure,” “reduction in cost offset would not exist.” Ten schools become nine, then eight. “Are we going to take another school off?” Previously taken-off-the-table items would return. Partner restart window already lost. District-managed restart is possible; documents would have to change “within hours.” “These are very hard to do and we’re doing lots of them already.” He does not want both Mendez and Widen “not there.”

Kaufman: she is not asking only about Widen — also Barrington, Bedichek, Winn, Dawson, Martin. “We’re not sacrificing a community for the greater good.” Segura: they have already adjusted (no split, no F campus). Remaining constraints: balanced budget, accountability risk, TEA agreed order, limited resources. “There are lots of schools… that I’m really sorry about. I mean, I feel devastated that we have to do this, but… we just don’t have options.” If empty seats and TAP risk are no longer the board’s concern, “I would need to know that.”

Hunter — what restart actually does to the staff you love — [01:39:23]–[01:42:24]

Last year’s “save our school” meant restart; community “did not understand what that meant.” “The thing that they loved about their school, their principal, their teachers, that’s the thing that has to turn over.” Dobie: “Miss ___ not here anymore.” “That’s a Sophie’s choice.” Segura: Widen is 3 UA; district-managed restart means **60% of core educators “highly effective”** (years, TIA, National Board — “not Matias’s definition… the state of Texas”). Principal must have gone F to C. “A pretty significant turnover.” Classified and non-core can stay. “It is a different school.”

Quintana — Widen staff counts — [01:42:24]–[01:46:47]

Her numbers: five TIA, 10 highly effective/distinguished, 91% certified, 96% in-field, ~88 with three-plus years. Hosek: TIA vs. TAP eligibility is a slight expansion; principal told her yesterday **eight core TAP-eligible plus eight non-core** (essential areas, pre-K) = 16, plus 12 classified/TAs (no TAP requirement), two front office, five cafeteria, three custodial. “Wouldn’t be an entire sweep.” Segura: 60% is a minimum; a new principal must pick a leadership team. “I don’t want the presumption… that every single person you just listed would perhaps remain.” Quintana: Widen was B-rated in 2019; she would be “surprised if the quality of our teachers have changed.”

Singh — trajectories and TAP targets — [01:47:05]–[01:53:21]

Widen 49 to 57. Applause. “Many of these schools are actually on an upward trajectory.” Segura: about a dozen at 58–59. “The agency sees an F and it’s an F.” Winn 45 to 57. “This is really terrible.” Restart at Widen and Winn would replace “some of the most important people.” Thanks for Sanchez / Pickle / Wooten / Winn Montessori adjustments. TAP targets lack baselines; Eastside algebra Meets 11% last year, target 25% this year. Segura: percentages deceive on small n; one family can move a 150–180 student school C to F; “it happened this year in 2025 multiple times.”

Boswell — 2 UA vs 3 UA; 1882 vs closure; $18.25 million; student-mix analysis — [01:53:21]–[02:18+]

2 UA: plan now, implement 2026–27. 3 UA: implement as soon as approved (spring 2026) — hiring principals in December is already TAP action. 1882 and closure are **not interchangeable** at year five: students still take STAAR before a closure, so it does not consume the fifth year; 1882 pause does. Thanks educators and families for “rapid progress” it is “painful” to interrupt.

Slide 16: why aren’t supplemental hours / family supports / discretionary funds on 2 UA school-improvement campuses? Segura: it “adds up quickly” — **$18.25 million** summed. Pursuing grants so it doesn’t all hit general operating. Hosek: extra staffing frees Title dollars campuses now spend to keep a staff member. Boswell: “lean into our community… can you help us?” Analysis of combining EB / eco-dis / STAAR groups: weighted averages on splits, rebaseline.

Counsel (Kenneth Walker) **[02:18:13]:** Chapter 39 / 39A leave “a lot of room for interpretation.” TEA regulatory guidance “doesn’t carry the weight necessarily of law” but is “what they use.” Cognitive dissonance is real. Administration has worked “exhaustively with the agency.” “You are going to be living in this space tonight, tomorrow night, and probably for the next several years.”

Boswell names remaining worries **[02:19:43]:** Winn to Andrews (D) and Pecan Springs (multi-UA); Widen to Rodriguez (D) with Palm nearby and not a D; Barrington into a Wooldridge restart; Bedichek/Paredes; Martin/Marshall (D). “Students are bringing… mobility… hunger… a lack of health insurance.” Segura: splits were the first trustee instruction (don’t overload one school); then community said stay together. “These are ratings and… our students are more than a score.” Rodriguez a D now, a B last year. “They don’t fit in a clean box. The TEA box… never [was] going to because the system is so complex.”

Hunter clarifies for the public **[02:24:05]:** plans due **tomorrow, close of business, whole state, hundreds of them.** TEA has 60 days; Burnet/Webb/Dobie came back in a couple of weeks. Redlines, cure, resubmit. **3 UA must implement even if the school gets an A this year.** 2 UA = school improvement, implement 2026–27. Closure/reassign and restarts = 3 UA. Barrington TAP goes to Guerrero Thompson; because GT is high-performing, TEA would not expect the principal to turn over. Winn TAP follows the majority to Andrews; Montessori relocation is a separate administrative/board action.

Adjourn — [02:31:21]–[02:31:56]

Boswell thanks staff and the public waiting for the voting meeting. Whitley Chu moves to adjourn. **Hearing adjourned 7:32 p.m.**

Hearing record on the assigned terms

**Trustees — in the schools, or TEA/process/legal?** Both, in the same hour. Hunter: parent conferences, night phone calls, Dobie teachers gone, “Sophie’s choice.” Quintana: Widen TIA counts from the principal yesterday; classroom arithmetic. Singh: TEA written criteria, MAP-to-STAAR, ARD capacity. Kaufman: demographer, what if we reject one. Boswell: 2 UA/3 UA calendar, 1882 vs close, D receiving campuses, hunger and health insurance. Segura and counsel: TEA will not put it in writing; live in the risk. The hearing does not vote. The votes are Chapter 28.

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