On Friday, Sept. 11, the State Board of Education (SBOE) will vote on eight new charter school applications (18 school campuses) approved by Commissioner Mike Morath last month.

The proposed Heritage Academy curriculum includes content with racist elements. In addition, the Heritage Academy is proposing to use its public funds to enroll substantially fewer African American students and students who face challenges such as poverty than the surrounding public schools.

Will you speak during public testimony on Thursday (9/10) at 9 am at the SBOE Zoom meeting to testify against the approval of the Heritage Academy charter application in Houston?Its attendance zone would include Houston, Cy-Fair, Aldine and Spring Branch ISDs. 

The deadline to sign up to speak at the Thur, Sept 10, meeting is 5 pm TODAY using the link here.  If you are unable to speak you can email or call your SBOE member before the vote next Friday. To find out who your SBOE member is, click here. 

At the TEA interview on July 27, "TEA staff John Garland (at 53:50) asked if Heritage would be teaching Brer Rabbit, Tar Baby and slave dialect to 1st graders (in the Core Knowledge scope and sequence, which isn’t aligned to TEKS) and some teacher support materials that have “incendiary content about African Americans.” Heritage replied they would consider removing it or moving to a different grade. SBOE member Aicha Davis (1:49:30) expressed concern about Brer Rabbit and Heritage saying they would move it to 5th grade but not delete it."

Two other charter applicants—Rocketship and Doral— have redacted substantial information from their applications. The details of the contracts are not available to the public.

Approving these applications is like buying a pig in a poke.

If you register to speak, you must do so by 5 pm today (9/4) here. Below is information you can use to answer the registration prompts.

• Register for the Committee of the Full Board on Thursday September 10.
• Agenda Item to be presented to the Committee of the Full Board (COFB), Sept. 10, 2020
• COFB Item 1. Consideration of the Commissioner of Ed’s Generation 25 Open-Enrollment Charter School Proposals

You can also email or call your SBOE member before the vote next Friday. To find out who your SBOE member is, click here. 

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