Inside Dallas ISD

Liliana Valadez, current executive director of Parent Advocacy and Support Services at Dallas ISD, has strong ties to both Texas and the district. She proudly explains that her family did not migrate from any Hispanic country, but they were on the Texas side of the Rio Grande when Texas was born as a republic. Both her parents and grandmother were longtime educators–her father was the district’s first Hispanic high school principal back in the ‘70s, and her mother was one of Dallas ISD’s original bilingual curriculum writers. Valadez herself is a product of the district, having graduated from Bryan Adams…

To recognize the National School Lunch Program, serving nearly 30 million children each day nationwide, Dallas ISD schools is celebrating National School Lunch Week from October 12 until 16, 2020.  The theme, “Now Playing:  School Lunch!” spotlight the importance of a healthy school lunch. “A healthy lunch is a great way to ensure students get the best education they can,” said Michael Rosenberger, Executive Director of Dallas ISD’s Food & Child Nutrition Services. “National School Lunch Week helps us educate parents and students about all the healthy, great tasting, and appealing lunch choices we offer.” Planned activities for the week…

Dallas Summer Musicals (DSM) and Dallas Independent School District (Dallas ISD) have joined forces to launch a new professional development program, ConnectEDU powered by PNC. ConnectEDU is the first program to be implemented as part of the brand new partnership formed between DSM and Dallas ISD with the intent to bring the spirit of Broadway to virtual learning and engagement opportunities for students and educators throughout the district. ConnectEDU is focused on providing high-quality professional development opportunities for theatre and dance educators that will increase cultural intelligence in the classroom. The goal of the program is to provide Dallas ISD…

While Veronica De La Torres is no longer assisting physicians with open-heart surgeries, she potentially helped save the lives of Dallas residents and Dallas ISD families this summer. The registered nurse worked tirelessly–inside and outside her clinic at Young Women’s STEAM Academy (YWSA)–to make sure that her students, their families, and the patients at a local hospital survive Covid-19. YWSA is an all-girls middle school with a number of Special Education units, including an Activities of Daily Living (ADL) classroom. ADL units serve students who exhibit severe to profound cognitive delays and who may also exhibit varying degrees of physical…