Marlin ISD on improvement-required list for 6th year despite improvements

Marlin Independent School District made its most

significant strides this year toward meeting state accountability ratings, but the district still landed on the state’s improvement-required list for the sixth consecutive year.

It has been on the list of districts failing state standards longer than any other.

Marlin ISD’s fate remains unclear despite Education Commissioner Mike Morath’s statement earlier this year that the district is unlikely to be closed anytime soon, Texas Education Association officials said after the release of preliminary accountability reports Tuesday morning.

This year’s State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness improvements don’t guarantee Marlin will remain open, but officials say the momentum is going in the right direction.

“The needle is moving,” said Van LeJeune, the district’s teaching and learning director. “We’re not there yet, and we still have a long way to go, but it does give everybody a little bit of hope. When you see what you’re doing is working, it spurs you on to do even better.”

Marlin officials have been fighting to keep the district open since it landed on the improvement-required list for the fourth consecutive year in 2015, meeting the threshold for closure. An abatement agreement kept the district open at the time and allowed the TEA to appoint a board of managers to replace the elected school board after another failure last year.

A new agreement with the state gives Morath broad authority over the district’s fate since it failed accountability ratings this year. He is expected to make a decision on its accreditation status after final academic and financial accountability ratings are published in the spring, TEA spokeswoman DeEtta Culbertson said.
Source http://www.wacotrib.com/news/education/marlin-isd-on-improvement-required-list-for-th-year-despite/article_8f155e40-a1f7-58c7-a06b-300f507bbc8f.html