Largest School District in Texas Eliminates Libraries, Converts Them to Disciplinary Centers

[Jilly_in_VA]

The largest public school district in the state of Texas is converting libraries in 28 schools into disciplinary centers and eliminating school librarian positions, local news outlets reported on Thursday. The alarming change comes as part of a sweeping reform program led by the Houston Independent School District’s (HISD) new superintendent Mike Miles, who oversees 85 schools. Of the remaining 57 schools with libraries, the district said each will be assessed on a case-by-case basis, indicating more libraries could be closed.

Under Miles’ New Education System (NES) program, libraries in the 28 schools will become “Team Centers,” where “kids with behavioral issues will be sent,” per the Houston-based NBC affiliate, KRPC. The district has said librarians at these schools “will have the opportunity to transition to other roles within the district.” Miles was notably appointed by the Texas Education Agency despite fierce opposition from local leaders; he’s previously led Dallas’ school district and oversaw a controversial program that tied teachers’ pay to standardized test scores, which saw long-time teachers depart due to pay disparities.

Educators are understandably dismayed that libraries—an invaluable resource for young minds—are being taken away from kids, and converted into punishment centers, no less. “It was such a joy to help them find the perfect book,” one former school librarian in the district told KRPC. She continued, “My heart is just broken for these children that are in the NES schools that are losing their librarians.”

Miles has acknowledged that students in his district are behind on their reading levels, raising questions about how the elimination of libraries could worsen this. “Our less fortunate students are the ones that suffer the most; primarily because many of them live in situations that are reading deserts,” another former HISD librarian said. “They don’t have access to the reading materials. They don’t have a choice in the reading materials that they are given to read.”

The move has also been condemned by Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner: “You don’t close libraries in some of the schools in your most underserved communities, and you’re keeping libraries open in other schools,” the mayor said at a city council meeting on Wednesday evening. “What the hell are you doing?”

https://jezebel.com/largest-school-district-in-texas-eliminates-libraries-1850686093

If I lived in Texas...I wouldn't any more. Inhumane political system, no medical care, and basically no educational system. Talk about a shithole country.....

[Hermit-The-Prog]

1. Reputicans have always favored prisons over schools.

[bucolic_frolic]

2. Yay! Caning children makes 'em tough and ready!

Ready for what, that's the question.

[FalloutShelter]

3. Wow will they learn to make license plates there?

Mind blowing.

[Faux pas]

4. Kickin' with DISGUST

Making the pipeline to private prisons more expedient

[orthoclad]

5. When a community college closed its library,

the accrediting committee ordered them to reopen it.

Can schools, not colleges, lose their accreditation over this?

[soldierant]

52. That would depend, I expect,

on whether Texas requires its public schools to be accredited.

I just looked up "educational accreditation" and didn't learn much, but I didn't spend much time on it either. It sounds to me like something that states would do (or not do), and if that's the case, it also sounds like something Texas would not do. But that isn't fact, just gut feeling, and could be very far off.

[orthoclad]

63. The accrediting committee I referred to was interstate, but

grade schools might be a different kettle.

[lostnfound]

67. Worst part is that most of these are elementary schools

Out of 28 I think 6 were middle schools and 2 were high schools. The rest were elementary.
The goals are abuse, brainwashing and beating the bravery out of them, I suspect. Early.

[orthoclad]

68. Train 'em up young

Especially get them used to submitting to armed authority roaming the halls.

[dalton99a]

6. Abbott's hatchet man in Houston, Mike Miles:

[JanMichael]

12. Ghoul.

[Bluethroughu]

22. Demonic.

[SouthernDem4ever]

42. What a strange idiot

This is a softer form of book burning. Very Orwellian.

[Dave Bowman]

55. What a particularly slimy specimen of a clueless moron.

Or maybe he's getting something out of it. On top of being a moran.

[GreenWave]

7. If'n them there kids git any ideas in their heads

they will be hard to indoctrinate into white supremacy.

[DFW]

8. To Texas Republicans, "literacy" is a dirty word

Presumably in a few other states as well..........

[keep_left]

9. I read somewhere a quote about how "Texas took the school-to-prison pipeline...

...and removed the school!"

[haele]

10. Was he elected superintendent of schools, or is this a state office?

He's definitely acting like a GOP tool. Wonder what he ran on if he was elected?
On edit - ohh, according to the article, he was appointed. Guess the previous Superintendent was too lenient to "those folks". He was also kicked out previously at the same position for tying teacher's pay to SAT scores, another stupid idea created to give lip service to folks who don't understand the nature of teaching.
He's a "results oriented" type of administrator.

Haele

[riversedge]

13. The article says Miles was appointed............

Miles was notably appointed by the Texas Education Agency despite fierce opposition from local leaders; he’s previously led Dallas’ school district and oversaw a controversial program that tied teachers’ pay to standardized test scores, which saw long-time teachers depart due to pay disparities. .......................

[ExWhoDoesntCare]

37. Not SAT scores

But the standardized tests all Texas students have to take during their K-12 years. I'm not sure how they work, but I doubt they exist to encourage learning.

[NowISeetheLight]

11. RepubQcan Poker

DeSatan and Abbott at the final table.

DeSatan - I bet Disney tax zone

Abbott - I'll see that and raise you bouys in the river

The Flop

DeSatan - I bet transgender rights

Abbott - I'll see that and raise you throwing babies in the river.

The River

DeSatan - I bet book bans

Abbott - I'll see your bet and raise you entire libraries

[onetexan]

14. Ugg..this guy was in charge of Dallas ISD as well 8 years ago

https://www.texastribune.org/2023/06/21/mike-miles-houston-isd-dallas-tea-takeover/

During the first Houston ISD school board meeting led by the board of managers that the Texas Education Agency appointed as part of the state’s recent takeover of the district, many community members were upset they didn’t see Miles until he came in the very end. Eight years ago, after a tumultuous three years as superintendent of the Dallas ISD, Miles didn’t show up to his last board meeting.

Already, the manner in which Miles has begun his new position in Houston is drawing comparisons with his short-lived stint in Dallas. Within a week of being appointed to lead Houston ISD, the largest school district in Texas, Miles announced an overhaul of certain campuses and a new program that will pay teachers more to work with students struggling academically, steps that resemble his approach during his last superintendent gig.

But while his management methods laid the foundation for some future success in Dallas ISD, they also left behind various scandals, caused veteran educators to leave the district and ultimately scores remained largely flat on state's standardized test.

[Freethinker65]

15. Why stop there? Close the schools entirely and lease out the kids to GOP businesses

Call it unpaid "job training". Plenty of opportunities in outdoor construction, agriculture/livestock/oil industry, and/or dealing with heavy dangerous equipment.

[Bluethroughu]

25. That's not far fetched in red area school districts.

They allow below minimum wages for underage workers...

Why, they are doing the same job as people over 18.

It's BS.

[Tesha]

16. Mark Twain said:

"Every time you stop a school, you will have to build a jail.
What you gain at one end you lose at the other.
It's like feeding a dog on his own tail.
It won't fatten the dog."

[kimbutgar]

17. Are they going to burn the books?

Now that the library will no longer be a library?

Discipline centers sound more like detention centers for bad behavior.

[Bluethroughu]

27. They allow corporal punishment there, sickos!

[ashredux]

18. Incredible insanity... who are these people? What on earth are they thinking?

Oh wait, I see they’re not thinking… what on earth happened to the GOP?

[ExWhoDoesntCare]

40. Why do you think it's changed?

If you didn't see that they had chosen stupidity over thinking when reagan came along. then I don't know what to tell you.

[CloudWatcher]

19. Onion?

I kept looking for clues that this was satire. Omg I'm beyond disgusted.

[SleeplessinSoCal]

21. We have lost our collective common sense.

And handed our children's future over to ghouls.

[EarnestPutz]

32. Read the first few lines and looked up expecting it to be the Onion. Sadly, no.

[Bluethroughu]

20. If you live in Texas and you are not in the streets general striking yet...

You should be in your car finding a new state to live in. Check out IL, MICH, MN. We're doing just great up without those 3rd world political priorities.

[Javaman]

23. I keep telling people that Texas is the most fascist state in the nation.

it tells every other red state to hold my beer.

[JCMach1]

24. Modest Proposal: just set these up as mini detention centers: get those kids

In the prison pipeline earlier.

[Hekate]

26. I'm sure the disciplinary centers will be full to overflowing with ADHD kids, black kids, brown kids

… kids who came to school hungry and can’t concentrate, kids who need eyeglasses and a hearing check… Notice this covers all ethnicities, but always lower socioeconomic class.

But hey, make sure you get them trained up for a life in and out of prison.

[orangecrush]

48. +1

[Vinca]

28. Keep 'em dumb. Future GOP voters.

[Paladin]

29. If the HISD can find a way to fuck things up, it will do so.

I have a number of friends in Houston with kids---all of those kids go to private schools, at considerable expense to the families. The downward spiral of the HISD has been going on for decades. It's a damn shame---Houston is the most Democratic city in a state that's desperately in need of more Democratic influence...

[3825-87867]

30. They will turn off the air conditioning in those

library camps.

The Texas heat will do the same job, albeit MUCH slower than other historical places.

[FakeNoose]

31. "Let's PUNISH those bad kids for not reading books!"

[cannabis_flower]

33. You know...

It isn’t that easy to just pick up and move. Especially if you are poor.

[Midnight Writer]

34. How can you keep them on the farm once they've seen pictures of gay Paree?

Ignorance and discipline, the key qualities of worker drones.

Gotta get'em while they're young.

[Trueblue Texan]

35. This is racial discrimination.

Houston has more people of color than other districts in the state. I hope they are suing over this.

[murielm99]

36. Not the Onion?

I am glad I don't live in Texas.

[Scalded Nun]

38. After decades of trying to change things here we have given up. We leave next month for NM

Besides the numerous atrocities committed by the GOP in this state, this one really is heartbreaking. I so feel for the youth in that district. They are having their futures taken from them as I am certain more educational pain will follow, and will continue to do so until the vermin running this state are politically eliminated. They are sick, they are perverse.

And yes, this is a shithole state.

[Old Crank]

39. Good thing these guys are Christians

Just think of how nasty they would be without theie religion of love???

sarcasm

[dalton99a]

41. And Texas has a $32.7 billion budget surplus.

[AmBlue]

43. This is shocking!

I can't even. I so hope the likes of Abbott and this school superintendent will be shit-canned next cycle. There is NO excuse for this!!!!

[MayReasonRule]

44. Fascists Barb-wiring Rivers For Babies Are Converting Libraries Into Disciplinary Institutions

Why am I not surprised?

[pandr32]

45. From knowledge springs hope.

Thomas Jefferson wanted libraries/knowledge to be publicly available and believed that an educated populace was necessary for the American experiment to succeed and develop.
We now have the opposite. They push Christian Nationalism in extreme forms and shut down everything that gives all but white Republican rich men autonomy.

[orangecrush]

46. 1984

[AllyCat]

47. Libraries to put in "discipline centers?"

Republicans are absolutely the most horrible people.

[honest.abe]

49. I thought this was The Onion.

[Snackshack]

50. I would say...

Where is the DOJ… setting aside how blatantly racist this is when you start confining people and taking away their freedom that is a little above this persons authority, he is a school superintendent not a law enforcement organization.

[Warpy]

51. Shit! Not the Onion!

Houston, at least part of it, is blue. Who the fuck are these people? Who was nuts enough to vote for these assholes?

If you need a center for kids who can't sit still or who talk out of turn, blah blah blah, send them to the GYM, that's the place they can run and jump and exercise the anxiety down to a manageable level. They'd have more success with that approach.

However, I suspect these are prune faced Puritan Republicans who would rather keep all the kids ignorant, powerless, and poor than deal reasonably with the kids who are chronic misbehavior problems.

[hunter]

56. In middle and high school I spent my lunches picking up litter...

... along the periphery of the school yard, usually because I'd mouthed off to a teacher or other adult.

Or I'd be in the library hiding out from bullies who'd call me "queerbait" and sometimes beat me bloody.

I liked picking up trash.

Under this system I'd no doubt be thrown into the "Disciplinary Center" with the bullies, no refuge at all, including some adults who, in a rational world, wouldn't be allowed anywhere near children.

I quit high school at sixteen. Without the school library as my refuge, and active solitary distractions like picking up trash or running laps, I probably wouldn't have made it through the eighth grade.

I didn't learn not to say whatever the hell pops into my head until I was a young man and someone took offence and sliced my arm open with a knife. The scar reminds me not to do that.

[Warpy]

61. I was strictly a library wraith, same reaon, really

I was quietly rebellious in school, but I'm sure some of the other misfits are still talking about some of the shit I pulled when nobody was looking. After school I made fireworks and blew shit up.

I'm sorry you had a tough time, too. I know I still have a deep and abiding loathing for bullies of any age, in any walk of life.

[hunter]

62. I always felt secure at home. That made all the difference. It probably saved my life.

Even when I was a teenage runaway from both school and home.

My siblings all remember when I punched my dad in the face, it was a really good punch, and I disappeared that year, but they were always confident I'd be back and all would be forgiven. As it was.

It was a fucking insane family tradition. My dad had done similar with his dad, and his dad had done similar with his dad, going God Only Knows how far back.

I'm proud of myself for breaking that tradition. My children are fiery as all hell and were fiery worse as teens but I never got knocked to the floor by a punch to my face, or in girl's family tradition, a knife in the metaphysical heart.

I like the term "library wraith." My first serious girlfriend was a library wraith. And goth too before goth was a thing. Damned skilled with mathematics. She thought Eraserhead would be a good date movie.

What's not to love about rockets and explosives?

[JohnnyRingo]

53. Incredible!!

I have a hard time believing what I'm reading.
I hope parents can do something about this. Something besides voting these rotten Republicans so far out of office they can't get a job at the BMV, of course.

[Dave Bowman]

54. Texas, the other crazy state along with Florida.

Not that there are not other states that have crazy laws and some unhinged people, unfortunately.

[Cheezoholic]

57. This is straight up out of the playbooks of the christofascist groups like the IBLP

Texas isn't the only place this is happening. Groups related to and modeled after the IBLP have been weaseling their way into public education under the radar for 2 decades.

My grandmother had a PHD in child psychology. She spent her life dealing with kids with behavioral issues and coming up with ways for school systems to help them. She started at a school system in central Indiana. Eventually the entire state adopted the programs her and her team had instituted as the base standard statewide for dealing, more importantly helping, behaviorally challenged children and their families. Her team traveled to several other states and also some countries in Europe to help guide educators and education systems. She worked full time until she was 77 then on an advisory level for another 5.

She would talk to me back in the late 90's when we had chances to visit that the biggest threat to education in this country were these religious groups and told me how they were slowly taking over small school districts and implementing these arcane education styles. It was her biggest fear because they used children with behavioral issues as their foot in the door and how their programs worked so well.

My grandfather served in the army as a dentist during WWII and after the war he was part of the post war army that was helping Germany recover by providing dental services for the German people. My grandmother taught English speaking classes for German children. She was very aware of not only Nazi Germany but the people after the Nazi's were done with them and the incredible amount of mind programming many German people suffered.

She said these people slowly moving into our school systems were using those programming methods exactly like the Nazi's did. She fought and lobbied locally as much as she could until dementia finally took her away and she died at the age of 99.

These people are more evil than most could imagine. Sadly its stuff like this that reminds me of my grandmother and the wonderful work for children she devoted her life to. I miss her so much in these insane times but my memories of her not only guide me but remind me that caring, giving and loving will put these evil shits on their knees in the end.

[area51]

64. Your grandmother sounds like a wonderful person.

[RussBLib]

58. I wonder if this is the result of the Texas Lege....

...recently "taking over" the administration of HISD? As I understood it, that power grab was not final, but this story, while it doesn't mention the takeover, suggests it's a done deal. This would be Republicans thinking they know better than Democrats how to teach kids. HISD operates in blue Houston, and some schools have fared worse than others on test scores and graduation rates, naturally. You will never have every single school in a district as large as HISD performing at the same high level. Schools reflect income disparities of their areas. Sadly, mostly black schools have never received the same level of resources that mostly white schools do, even under Democrats. Republicans paint HISD as "out of control" and "failing" when a few schools in poorer neighborhoods are not doing as well as others in richer neighborhoods. They use those poorer schools as reasons to take over the district, but Texas Republicans are not going to do a single fucking thing to try to improve those troubled schools, except shit like this: replace libraries with detention centers.

The GOP has become a malevolent, malignant party of racists and misogynists.

[niyad]

59. This is The Onion, yes???? PLEASE tell me that this is The Onion.

[Takket]

60. going to say the same thing I always say when stories like this pop up......

Educated people vote Democratic Party


so... put two and two together.......

[Pacifist Patriot]

65. I really thought this was an Onion headline at first.

[Celerity]

66. me too! (and I am almost never fooled by this)

what the fuckery