Inside Dallas ISD

Four campuses have advanced to the next round in the NCAA’s Read to the Final Four® contest for Dallas Independent School District third-graders. The bracket style tournament mimics the NCAA Final Four basketball tournament schedule, with schools advancing based on how many minutes students read outside school hours. Since November, third-graders from across the district have been counting the number of minutes they read each day. The Final Four advanced from the Elite 8 round. The schools in the Final Four are Highland Meadows Elementary, José “Joe” May Elementary, T.G. Terry Elementary, and Pleasant Grove Elementary. The prizes provided by the NCAA and the…

A group of young entrepreneurs at Sunset High School has earned the campus a Gold Level Certification for their work operating and managing the school store. Sunset teacher Marcus Nickerson leads the DECA School Store class that researched and wrote a 37-page report on the school-based enterprise (SBE). The report details everything from the cash flow, profit/loss margin, inventory tracking and marketing plan for the business. Students in the class also operate the store through positions such as barista, financial clerk, store manager, and inventory specialist. DECA, a student organization that prepares emerging leaders and entrepreneurs, recognized Sunset High School and…

Dallas ISD trustees unanimously approved a policy change that will bring a new approach to how schools respond to disruptive students in pre-K–2nd grade. Under the policy change and pending approval to the student code of conduct, students in pre-K–2nd grade who commit Level 1 offenses—which are the lowest-level infractions such as classroom disruption and bus misconduct—will not receive out-of-school suspensions. The new approach will also provide additional support to schools. All pre-K–2nd-grade teachers will receive a comprehensive training session at the beginning of the school year focused on how to best respond to a disruptive student. The district will…

About 150 Dallas ISD students tasted and rated approximately 65 food items being considered for next year’s cafeteria menu. The Dallas ISD Food and Child Nutrition Services Department will review and incorporate the students’ feedback when determining the final cafeteria menu for the 2017–2018 school year. Watch the above video for a tasty inside look at the event.