Congratulations, Wooldridge. Dedication did what the formula did not.

They still could. The district did not put money behind that.

On Dec. 9, 2025, while 2025–26 was still in session, Superintendent Segura appointed Nick Martinez, then principal of Wooten Elementary, as Wooldridge principal for 2026–27. Former Principal Juan Cardenas stayed through the end of last year and led the campus that posted the B. He already knew the next-year job was assigned to someone else.

Wooten’s rating for that same last year is an F. Wooldridge’s is a B. About 83 Barrington students were zoned into Wooldridge for 2026–27 as Barrington closed. ACE restart means last year’s staff reapply; the new principal hires. For 2026–27 the school is not even at 1412 Norseman Terrace. AISD swung it into the closed Barrington campus at 400 Cooper Drive while the home site is rebuilt with 2022 bond money. That is an older building on a high-traffic North Austin corridor — I-35 / Rundberg country — after the year they earned a B.

Questions those dates raise

• What does it cost a campus to finish an F-to-B year after December, when the principal already knows he is gone at year’s end?
• Why bring the Wooten principal to Wooldridge for 2026–27, when Wooten scored an F last year and Wooldridge scored a B?
• How many of last year’s Wooldridge staff returned, and how many came from Wooten with Martinez?
• Why add Barrington children to a campus that had just earned a B, then restaff it instead of keeping the people who earned the letter?

They overcame the odds. On the report card that is a major achievement. Properly funded across the board — hires, wages, teaching tools — the question is what that same staff could have done next. What they got was not that. ACE restart: reapply; the new principal hires. Cardenas out. More students from Barrington. A swing into the closed Barrington building. The new principal came from Wooten, which printed an F the same year they printed a B.

The B was dedication, not a surplus. Staff who buy materials themselves are working after recapture: 46.3 cents of each FY2024–25 general-fund dollar went to the state, and the extra weights for need still sit on a frozen allotment. The rainy-day fund held $27.5 billion on June 30, 2026. That pile did not become wages or tools in this building. See the recapture bill.