District Innovation plans give schools more local control

By Jessica Coleman
Staff Writer

Two Jackson County schools, Edna ISD and Ganado ISD, have approved District of Innovation plans, and Industrial is expected to follow.

District of Innovation plans are plans that allow school districts to “waive” regulations that are counterproductive for the district. The plans are designed to give more control to local administrators and school boards, with the idea in mind that not all regulations work for all schools, and implementing District of Innovation plans allow them a certain amount of autonomy.

Things like school start dates and teacher certification requirements can be left up to districts instead of one-size-fits-all regulations.

Edna ISD Superintendent Robert O’Connor said it’s all about local control. The philosophy is that a school is best governed by those who know the school’s individual situation.

Things like finding teachers for very specialized classes, particularly tech classes, can be difficult for schools, especially given that regulations state that those teachers must have a teaching certification.

“Say you’ve got a drafting or an engineering class,” said O’Connor, “and say there is an engineer in town who is retired willing to come up and teach a class on engineering. He is an engineer. He is probably well-qualified to teach an engineering class.”

Another consideration was the date school is set to start.

Regulations that say school can’t begin until after the fourth Monday in August would mean classes would begin very late that month. The District of Innovation plans allow schools to waive that start date, and begin classes earlier, meaning the calendar can be set for school to let out earlier. O’Connor said Edna ISD’s goal is to end school before Memorial Day.

Among educators, school days after Memorial Day are famously unproductive, as most tests are already taken and studies have concluded. Usually they are used as “fun days.”

Industrial Curriculum Director Missy Klimitchek said one of the options they plan to use is to waive the requirement to notify the community when class size in grades kindergarten through four reach above 22 students.

“Nine times out of 10, we will reach that limit, go through all the paperwork, tie up our resources, and then a student will move away,” she said, “We rarely allow classes to get that large anyway, and those families tend to be more mobile when their kids are in those younger grades. They change schools more regularly than our older students do.”

According to Klimitchek, those resources can now be used on something more productive for student learning.

District of Innovation plans allow districts some wiggle room in educating students, and districts across Texas are making plans that better fit their districts, regarding everything from scheduling, to hiring, to finding what they say are better ways to spend their resources, both financial and otherwise.