Cameron ISD board talks enrollment, testing
Cameron Independent School District board members heard reports on enrollment and academic performance during a meeting Jan. 11.
Enrollment at Cameron ISD has been on the decline due to COVID.
CISD Superintendent Kevin Sprinkles said there are currently 1,570 students enrolled as of Jan. 8.
He said that is a 9 percent loss from the end of the prior school year.
“What is happening is not unique to Cameron ISD,” he said. “But it is troubling. I think if you compare us to other districts throughout the state they are seeing the same trend. There are some districts not losing enrollment.”
He said they are concerned about the home school numbers and what happens when those students do return to the classroom, saying that will be an “academic track meet” when those students return.
“We are doing everything we can to reach out to those parents and students,” he said. “I think we will get those students back once this all passes.”
CISD Assistant Superintendent Dr. Mistie Dakroub reported to board members about the Texas Academic Performance Report during the meeting, telling board members that the school district will not be held accountable for test scores this year by the Texas Education Agency.
She said that there will be testing from the state this spring.
“The good thing about that is that we need this data,” Dakroub said. “I was sad that after all the hard work everyone put in last year there was no TAPR data to look at to see what our growth was last year.”
She said the district is working off of the prior year’s data since there was no testing this past spring due to remote learning.
“We did great in some areas,” she said. “Things that are important are that we want to be 10 points above the state numbers.”
She said that with students being out in the spring there were slides.
“I wish we had gotten to see how much we had grown from the beginning of last year until March,” she said. “Though we have grown from the beginning of this year, we started in a deficit this year.”
She said they are excited to see where the students are after testing this spring.
“We saw a very significant slide from COVID,” Sprinkles said. “We saw a slide from where students were in March to where they started this year. Which is concerning. “
He said knowing that there are many students that didn’t return to the classroom concerns them.
“We are seeing significant improvement this year, but we are still below the state,” he said. “We have to challenge ourselves and have high expectations. We are making strides, but we haven’t made that shift yet. When you have a group of students that are reading at 36 percent at grade level and you get them to 69 percent at Spring Break and when they return the following year for the next grade level and they are at 30 percent, that is concerning. That is what the COVID-19 shutdown did to us.”
In other business the board also called for an election on May 1 for three spots on the board. The terms of Franci Denio, Greg Hoelscher and Michael McAnulty are expiring. Filing for the election is open through Feb. 12. Call the Administration Office at (254) 697-3512 for more information.