The Texas Education Agency is slapping the New Jersey-based company that develops and administers the state’s controversial STAAR tests with a $20.7 million fine over widespread logistical and technical issues.
Kiah Collier
Kiah Collier was a reporter for the ProPublica-Texas Tribune investigative initiative from 2020 through 2023. She previously worked at the Tribune as a reporter and associate editor, covering energy and the environment through the lens of state government and politics. Kiah has reported for numerous other publications across Texas since 2010, including the Austin American-Statesman and the Houston Chronicle. Her beats also have included government and politics, public education and business. Kiah’s work has been honored with numerous prizes, including a George Foster Peabody Award, a Gerald Loeb Award, the Knight-Risser Prize for Western Environmental Journalism, the National Edward R. Murrow Award for best investigation and the AAAS Kavli Science Journalism Award. A seventh-generation Texan, she grew up in the Austin area and graduated with high honors from the University of Texas at Austin with degrees in journalism and philosophy.
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Public Education
Judge Denies State’s Request to Toss STAAR Suit
After a group of parents sued the Texas Education Agency over the 2016 administration of STAAR exams, state lawyers argued they had no standing and asked the courts to drop the case. A Travis County district court judge has denied their request.
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Public Education
Fort Worth-Based Federal Judge Blocks Obama Transgender Guidelines
A federal judge in Fort Worth has blocked Obama administration guidelines directing the nation’s public schools to allow transgender students to use bathrooms and other facilities that align with their gender identity.
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Public Education
How a South Texas School District Spurred a Massive Turnaround
After five years of landing on the state’s list of low-performing schools, a tiny South Texas district that drew national headlines for cutting its sports program to ward off closure is now meeting state academic standards.
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Public Education
GOP Senators Spar over Value of Pre-K Spending
At an education committee hearing Tuesday, Republican state senators debated whether a $118 million pre-K initiative championed by Gov. Greg Abbott is worth the money.
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Public Education
Failing Texas Schools Facing Tougher State Intervention
Education Commissioner Mike Morath on Tuesday outlined plans to crack down harder on chronically low-performing schools, saying he wants to cut in half the number of them that end up on the state’s failing list over the next five years.
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Public Education
Amid STAAR Test Backlash, School Performance is Mixed
More Texas school districts and charter schools are failing in 2016, though the number of individual campuses that received that label decreased.
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Public Education
School Finance Dividing Lines Emerge at Hearing
The fault lines that will define efforts to improve the state’s system of funding education came into sharp focus Wednesday as a Senate panel began studying how to improve the “efficiency” of public schools in Texas.
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Public Education
Lawmakers Look at Tying School Funding to Performance
Should Texas fund public schools based on their academic performance rather than just giving them a certain amount of money per student? State lawmakers are beginning to explore that idea.
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Public Education
Panel Backpedals on Swapping Out STAAR Tests
A special panel recommending changes to the state’s public school testing and accountability system has stopped short of proposing that Texas scrap the controversial assessment regime known as STAAR.
