SBOE approves TEKS revisions

In a Special Meeting Sept. 26, the Texas State Board of Education (SBOE)approved changes required by Senate Bill 3 related to Civics instruction and teacher training in Civics instruction along a party line vote of 8-5. 

District 8 SBOE member Audrey Young said, “The new law directed the SBOE to align the K-12 Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) - the state’s required curriculum and education content standards guidelines - with the requirements set forth in SB 3.”

Some of the changes include requiring students to “analyze and evaluate a variety of economic information from primary and secondary sources for validity, credibility, accuracy, bias, propaganda, point of view and frame of reference,” and “explain governmental and democratic processes such as voting, due process, and caucuses using simulations and models.”

What does SBOE do?

Young is one of 15 SBOE members, each representing approximately 1.7 million Texans. Her district includes Brazos, Grimes, parts of Harris, Houston, Montgomery, Polk, San Jacinto, Trinity and Walker counties. 

While setting curriculum standards is at the top of the list, the board reviews and adopts instructional materials, establishes graduation guidelines, oversees the Texas Permanent School Fund and appoints board members to military, reservation and special school districts. 

In addition, they provide a final review of rules proposed by the SBOE for educator certification and review the commissioner’s proposed award of new charter schools, with authority to veto a recommended applicant.

As for the nature of SBOE’s responsibility where the recent hot-button public school library book issue is concerned, Young said, “We are, and we aren’t. The Governor asked the state board to review it. The state board then sent a request to the state library association for their list of approved books and they were supposed to get back to us in January and they have not done so.”

Accountability

Another area of SBOE oversite is training of school boards and determining what that specific training is. 

Young said, “It’s also legislatively driven.”
She continued, “I don’t think school board members understand as well as they should that they have one employee and that’s the superintendent. If things are bad in a school district, it’s on your superintendent. He’s not holding the principals accountable, and the principals are not holding the teachers accountable, and the teachers are not holding the students accountable. If you don’t have Tier 1 (universal or core) Instruction and Tier 2 (targeted or strategic) Instruction, that’s ultimately in the end, the school board’s responsibility because they’re not holding their one employee’s feet to the fire.”

Open Meetings

SBOE meetings are held at the William B. Travis State Office Building, 1701 North Congress Avenue in Austin and are open to the public.

Young said, “We meet five times a year for 4-5 days at a time. We also meet for special-called sessions. Our board functions year-round and does not follow the Texas Legislature schedule.”

According to Young, the meetings are usually held Monday or Tuesday and the request to make public comments becomes available online the preceding Thursday.

She said, “The online registration closes in 24 hours. If you don’t make it, you can come to the board meeting and request (in writing) to speak 30 minutes prior to the start of the board meeting.” 

Challenges

Young sees narrowing down the priorities and giving them the time and attention needed to produce a solution as one of their most challenging tasks.

That being said, she added, “We implement what the Legislature directs us to do quite well. I believe we could do better by working more with our legislators in the area of education since we are the direct link to public education in Texas.”

Young has worked in public education for 29 years as a speech therapist, reading specialist, middle school administrator and district director. She is presently the Director of Student Support Services at Nacogdoches ISD and was elected to the SBOE in November 2020.