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Superintendent Angélica Ramsey, left, school board President Roxanne Martinez and trustee Anne Darr listen to a presentation from Deputy Superintendent Mohammed Choudhury during a board workshop Sept. 10, 2024. (Matthew Sgroi | Fort Worth Report)
” data-medium-file=”https://fortworthreport.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/DSC_1009.jpg?fit=300%2C200&ssl=1″ data-large-file=”https://fortworthreport.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/DSC_1009.jpg?fit=780%2C520&ssl=1″ tabindex=”0″ role=”button”>Fort Worth ISD trustee Wallace Bridges let out a breath before asking his question.His query at the Sept. 10 meeting, when trustees reviewed the district’s unofficial and self-reported accountability ratings, was one he has made repeatedly since his election in 2022.“I’m going to ask the same question I asked a year ago, because we were pretty much looking at the same thing when it came to African American students,” Bridges said, prefacing a question to Deputy Superintendent Mohammed Choudhury. “Why do you think we’re not moving at the same pace?” The “Groundhog Day” situation Bridges experiences when repeatedly asking for breakdowns of student outcome data by demographic groups mirrors Fort Worth ISD’s stagnant state standardized exam scores. While administrators touted improvements in their A-F rating calculations over the past year, the underlying data that forms the foundation of the grades remains nearly unchanged stretching back a decade.Fort Worth ISD disclosed that it was a C-rated district during the 2023-24 school year, a drop from the B the state issued during its last official ratings in 2022. Lawsuits over changes to the accountability system prevented the Texas Education Agency from releasing ratings for the past two years. Administrators said the C represented an increase from the D they estimated Fort Worth ISD would have received in 2023.Fort Worth ISD has to exceed the pace revealed by the figures it crunched in order to ensure future improvement, the deputy superintendent said. Consistent instruction across all campuses is key, he said.“I’m not going to give you a special program or anything,” Choudhury told Bridges. “Wherever we’ve been, and wherever the needle has moved, it’s been about giving high-quality instruction and making sure everyone is getting grade-level content, whether it’s the eastside or the westside.”By the numbersSince Superintendent Angélica Ramsey took over from Kent Scribner two years ago, Fort Worth ISD saw decreases in nearly all third to eighth grade subjects between 2022 and 2024, according to results from the State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness. Math is the only exception, with a 2 percentage point increase.!function(){“use strict”;window.addEventListener(“message”,(function(a){if(void 0!==a.data[“datawrapper-height”]){var e=document.querySelectorAll(“iframe”);for(var t in a.data[“datawrapper-height”])for(var r=0;r