A PE teacher who said she has her college degree just like all the other teachers at her school wanted to know why she wouldn't be paid as much as her colleagues who are English teachers. Houston ISD Superintendent Mike Miles provided little comfort to her Thursday night.

"I'm going to look you in the eye right now and say because nobody else in America wants to say it: Right now if we're behind in reading — and we are — two thirds of our students aren't reading at grade level; 89 percent of our African-American or Black kids are not reading at grade level in fourth grade.

"I don't need a PE teacher as much as I need a reading surgeon," he said, referring to his hospital model. "We're doing a hospital model or a pay for performance model where the position is looked at differently and is valued differently just like a neurosurgeon is a doctor but makes more money than a general practitioner, who's  also a doctor."
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Then again, at least the phys ed teacher has a job — unlike the 672 Central Office employees who just received word that they are out of work. In addition, 1,675 vacant central office positions will not be filled, bringing the grand total to 2,347. Previously, Miles had said there would be 500 to 600 cuts in Central Office. Now, Miles said, he has more detailed figures.

Thanks to his reorganization efforts, Miles announced Thursday that the Central Office has been downsized from 10,204 positions to 7,857. There are 800 new department positions while the schools division has been eliminated.  Instructional coaches are gone.

In addition, principals and assistant principals will see their workload increased as they take on the "instructional leader" role that they will be evaluated upon, as Miles has said. Support officers who used to be in the schools division will move to a  new "division superintendents/units office."  Human Resources took a hit, downsized from 235 to 153 positions.

Eliminating these positions will help, in part, to pay for the higher teacher and principal salaries and stipends at the 28 New Education System schools and the the stipends at the 57 NES-Aligned schools. That and a healthy fund balance that Miles has no hesitation about dipping into.

It is all part of what Miles calls a shift in thinking, that unlike nearly all other U.S. school districts, HISD moving forward will adapt a pay for performance model especially in needed areas like reading, rather than a years of service model. In response to questions, Miles said this is essentially the same system he installed in Harrison, Colorado and Dallas where there were elected not appointed school boards.

"We all have to shift our thinking. This is not about years of credit or years of experience in college credit. I get it. Ninety nine percent of all schools in America use the step and lane [where teachers earn raises for each additional year of experience "steps" and can move to higher "lanes" by earning more education credits and degrees]. We're not doing that. We're doing a hospital model or a pay for performance model."

The pay part, while attracting a lot of teachers to the 28 New Education System schools has resulted in a swell of criticism as teachers complain that they still don't know what they will be paid and others who do know, say it isn't what they thought they'd get.

Asked about why math instruction wasn't as valued as reading, Miles responded: "Math is important. It's a way of thinking more than anything else. So we need to have math and math skills. At the same time you cannot access almost any other subject without being able to read."


It was clear from the questions Thursday that teachers and parents continue to be concerned about how much autonomy instructors will have in the classroom since lesson plans will come from central office in the NES and NESA schools.  Miles said there will be no teacher autonomy in terms of what central point is taught each day but there is in how a teacher delivers that instruction.

Explaining the new "open door" policy, Miles said that doors to all the classrooms will be open during the school day because teachers should have nothing to hide. While certainly making it easier for principals to do a drive-by to see how things are going, there may be some competing noise factors to contend with.

Repeating the same message he's delivered to other groups, Miles said immediate changes were needed in HISD whose system he said "was not designed to educate all kids." Unless there's a drastic course correction, "We have zero chances of closing the gap."

For now, Mikes said his plan is to leave alone district schools that are doing well while turning his attention to the 28 New Education System schools and the 57 NES-Alligned schools that volunteered to jump into the new curriculum.

In an earlier session, Miles had announced a new bus schedule that would have classes at all NES and NESA schools starting and ending at the same time.

Thursday night he admitted that was unworkable and his administration was still tinkering with half hour adjustments to make the system work.

When one parent brought up the abysmal record of bus pickups her children experienced last year while attending Madison High— school buses either not picking them up at all or picking them up late — Miles couldn't offer much immediate help. She asked what changes were being implemented this next year to keep that from happening.

"It’s hard to change a whole transportation system over the summer. In any case, we're working on it right now to try to make it more effective. We've had several dry runs. We're hiring more bus drivers. As you know, part of the reason you had so many challenges with bus routes is when you don't have bus drivers showing up. So we're looking closely at that and might have to raise salaries for bus drivers. We're looking at a lot of options.

"Long-term and this is in the Destination 2035 Plan, we're going to be piloting and experimenting with an Uber-type transportation system for our parents who are willing to use it. Which will cost nothing for the parents or the students. That way you can pick up the phone or pre-arrange transportation with a secure, background-checked driver.

"We'll have that program which will probably be more reliable and efficient than our bus system today."