Inside Dallas ISD

Seventy graduating seniors at Irma Rangel Young Women’s Leadership School celebrated their “signing day” by publicly announcing on stage what college or university they will attend in the fall. Every student was accepted to a college or university. Other facts about the Class of 2017 include: The graduating seniors will be attending: 14 colleges out of state; 19 colleges in Texas; one student will enlist in the U.S. Navy. 100-percent of the seniors will graduate high school; The students have received offers of more than $9 million in academic and merit scholarships; Graduating seniors received acceptances from over 114 different colleges and…

Hillcrest High School graduating senior Lisbet Tudon Velazquez’s goal has been to make her parents, who immigrated to the United States almost 20 years ago, proud. Velazquez has balanced great grades, a job, playing lute in the school band—and much more—while in high school. She even attended a physics camp over the summer where she decided she wants to become an an engineer. Velazquez is set to study petroleum engineering in the fall at the University of Texas in Austin. Given all of Velazquez’s accomplishments, it’s no surprise that her parents are very proud.

Three nationally known children’s book authors visited Dallas ISD’s Thomas Tolbert Elementary School on Friday, May 19 – one of them possibly more notable for the eight years she lived in the White House. Former First Lady Laura Bush visited the school to announce the DFW-area winners of grants through the Laura Bush Foundation for America’s Libraries. Schools in Denton and Arlington are receiving grants in the latest round of awards. She also read the book, Our Great Big Backyard, co-written with her daughter Jenna Bush Hager. The story follows a family as they take a road trip to visit…

Students at the Innovation, Design, Entrepreneurship Academy (IDEA) put their entrepreneurship skills into practice, pitching their ideas for new apps and accompanying business plans to local community leaders at the Startup Tech Showcase. Student teams developed the business plans and functioning prototypes for each application over the past year in partnership with the Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship (NFTE – pronounced “nifty”). Each plan was designed to meet a need they identified in their community. One team created “Notefy,”a note-taking app that allows students to easily share notes with one another and includes built-in tips and games to help teach positive…