Texas Education Agency to delay Annual School Ratings Release Date

The Texas Education Agencyreported Tuesday it would postpone the release of its annual school ratings to represent scoring changes that could adversely influence schools under a redid rendition of the organization’s responsibility framework.

The TEA, which should deliver the appraisals on Sept. 28, anticipates that the rankings should be given at some point one month from now. It’s hazy whether the new evaluations will be declared under the steady gaze of legislators reconvening in Austin for an extraordinary meeting on state-funded training and school vouchers, as would be considered normal to be reported before the year’s end.

The delay comes after some objections from school authorities across the state who have said the TEA’s new responsibility framework would bring about unreasonable drops in their evaluations.

Under the framework, locale and their grounds are relegated to A grades consideringstudents’ outcomes in the state’s government-sanctioned test, scholastic development year-to-year, graduation rates, and how well they prepare children for a lifelong after secondary school. Guardians and local area individuals utilize these scores to perceive how their schools and regions are acting in teaching their kids.

The TEA said it delayed the release of this year’s ratings to adjust in the “academic growth” category. School districts experienced a huge rise in that category in 2022 as kids returned to the classroom after the pandemic and started doing better on the state test. The agency believed schools could see steep declines in their ratings if it didn’t account for test scores stabilizing and returning to pre-pandemic levels.

“The A-F system is designed to properly reflect how well our schools are meeting those high expectations, and the adjustments we are making this year will ensure it continues to serve as a tool for parents and educators to help our students,” TEA Commissioner Mike Morath said in a statement Tuesday.