That was just one issue discussed on Thursday as the district wraps up its sixth week of classes this school year. Data shared by HISD in the board meeting shows there was a pretty significant drop in teacher absences.
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The district reports a 37% drop in teacher absence for protected leave, which includes things like illness or jury duty. Last year around this time, there were about 15,000 teacher absences in that same category. Absence for unprotected leave is also down, as is leave for family and medical leave.
Another issue discussed was special education.
The district says there is a certified special education teacher on every campus, and they actually have more of those teachers than they need, so they're shuffling people around to campuses that may need help.
HISD has a shortage of other special education professionals like speech therapists.
"We have had an increase of students in need of speech-language services. That's something we continue to really look at. We have increased our teletherapy services for students that would be appropriate for," Superintendent Mike Miles said.
The district said they're in need of 37 speech therapists across the district.
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Additionally, a new TEA rating system for schools is supposed to be implemented later this month. Miles believes the new formula will show more HISD schools are falling behind and failing students.
"We're going to get some data from TEA pretty soon. This will confirm what I've been saying all along. Probably going to have many D and F schools. At least 70 maybe closer to 80," Miles said.
The district also shared some data regarding student discipline.
The numbers shown are for issues like fighting, failure to take directions - which saw the biggest decrease-- inappropriate physical contact, and derogatory behavior toward adults.
SEE RELATED STORY: Houston ISD Superintendent Mike Miles says he needs 4 to 5 years to turn the district around
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