(AUSTIN) – Commissioner of Education Mike Morath announced today that 20 school systems will participate in a pilot to develop its own local academic accountability system. The Texas Education Agency (TEA) will oversee a small-scale pilot program in the 2017–2018 academic year.

Established by House Bill 22 and passed during the 85th Texas Legislature earlier this year, the local accountability system program allows an independent school district (ISD) or public school charter to develop plans locally that evaluate its campuses.

The 20 systems participating in the 2017-2018 pilot are: Alief ISD; Austin ISD; Bullard ISD; Canadian ISD; Clear Creek ISD; Dallas ISD; El Paso ISD; Humble ISD; Jonesboro ISD; Lyford ISD; Midland ISD; Point Isabel ISD; Premier High Schools; Richland Collegiate High School; San Saba ISD; Sharyland ISD; Snyder ISD; Spring Branch ISD; Sunnyvale ISD; and Waco ISD.

Participating districts will be required to attend four monthly meetings hosted by TEA in the spring of 2018 as part of the local plan development. Once a plan receives TEA approval, districts and charter schools may use locally developed domains and indicators in conjunction with the three state-mandated domains to assign overall A–F ratings for each of its campuses.

Approved local accountability systems will be available for use beginning with the 2018–2019 school year.

For more information about the local accountability systems established by House Bill 22, visit the TEA website at https://tea.texas.gov/las.aspx.

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