HOUSTON — Friday was another busy day for new Houston ISD Superintendent Mike Miles and the new board of managers.
Miles spoke Friday morning about being on the job for just over 24 hours.
“Quality of instruction is the leading indicator,” he said. “The main job of the district is to have high-performing teachers, high-quality instruction and principals who can supervise and coach teamer to get high-quality instruction.”
You can see the entire speech he gave Friday morning here.
Miles spoke to KHOU 11 after an information session with teachers and instructional staff. He also met with leaders at North Forest High School.
Miles said he understands there are a lot of questions and concerns, which is why his number one priority right now is to provide as much information and clarity as he can to his faculty, especially to the staff at the 29 schools with employees who will have to re-apply for their jobs.
That includes North Forest, Kashmere and Wheatley, as well as their feeder schools.
This is the first big move from the district’s new superintendent.
KHOU 11 was the only news crew outside North Forest as Miles walked out Friday morning after wrapping up what he said was a meeting with nine principals to talk about the upcoming reforms.
The 29 schools are now part of the district's newly assigned 'New Education System' or NES schools.
When asked if it's because some of these schools have historically struggled, Miles said yes and no.
He says, currently, while some of these schools are performing well, they're still part of a feeder pattern, which he says overall is not doing well.
“If you think systemically, you can't just work on one or two schools,” he said. “If kids in this school feed into that school and this school is struggling, then you have the same problem year after year."
As for the existing school staff members, including the teachers, Miles said they’re still employed with the district and that their current contract will hold in the 2023-24 school year, but there's no guarantee they'll stay at the same school.
He says staff members will have to re-apply for their jobs during the open application process and if they aren't chosen for the position, he says they'll then be offered a different position within the district.
When asked why make the teachers re-apply, here’s what he had to say.
“One of the things that work with wholescale reform is to make sure you have an overwhelming number of high-performing teachers and so right now, it's hard to evaluate because the evaluation of teachers hasn't been rigorous, so it's hard to determine that, unless we go through a performance interview."
Miles went on to share that he's really encouraging these teachers to re-apply.