Inside Dallas ISD

It’s a Tuesday afternoon at Wilmer-Hutchins Elementary School, and eight fifth-graders are meticulously crocheting hats and scarves. Charlotte Geisler, the Wilmer-Hutchins Elementary Campus Teacher of the Year, leads the club that meets after lunch. Geisler makes monthly trips to a homeless shelter to donate the hats and scarves made by the students. “This not only teaches students a skill they can use for life, but it teaches them to give back,” Geisler said. For fifth-grader Daranisha, the club is a chance to have quiet time to reflect. “If I’m in a bad mood or having a bad day, this helps…

Parents looking for a school for their gifted child now have two additional options available in Oak Cliff. The district will open Roger Q. Mills School for the Talented and Gifted and Mark Twain School for the Talented and Gifted in August 2019. Both will cater to gifted students who need a challenging academic environment to reach their full potential. Admission is based on academic achievement, and applications are required. Mills is accepting applications for incoming first- through sixth-graders, and will eventually expand to eighth grade. Twain is accepting applications for students entering grades one through five. Applications will be…

As the director of Dallas ISD Dyslexia Services, Michelle Brown oversees a staff of 145 dedicated evaluators, interventionists and instructional leaders who support dyslexic students across the district. Within a two year timeframe, Brown has created and implemented a strategic plan that has led to the hiring of 121 dyslexia interventionists to provide multi-sensory instruction across the district. For her outstanding work, the Dallas International Dyslexia Association (IDA) has chosen Brown to receive the 2019 Excellence in Education Award. She will be recognized on Feb. 8 at the Dallas IDA’s 2019 Regional Conference. “I’m very humbled and thankful to have…

It’s a rare family that can boast of saving more than $100,000 in college tuition. One family that can definitely make that claim are the Edwards of Oak Cliff whose triplets—Michael, Morgan and Moriah graduated with their high school diplomas and tuition-free associate degrees from the Kathlyn Joy Gilliam Collegiate Academy in 2014. Like all Dallas ISD collegiate academies/early college high schools, Gilliam offered the Edwards triplets the opportunity to realize a savings of $40,000 each in college tuition. That’s the estimated cost of two years of tuition at a four-year college or university. The savings were just part of…