Inside Dallas ISD

There are magnet schools and special programs across Dallas ISD to help satisfy almost any career goal, passion or interest students have. One such school is Sidney Lanier Expressive Arts Vanguard, which gives elementary school students a taste of the arts. Lanier band teacher Shunnesse Allen said that fourth-graders at the school attend various classes on a rotation. They hold and play a variety of instruments to find the one that suits them, then they make the choice. “When they go to middle school, they are usually at an advanced level,” she said of the budding musicians. The school also…

W.H. Adamson High School head drum major David Reynoso was about to help lead a marching band performance last year when his marimba literally fell apart seconds before he was scheduled to perform. Reynoso barely put the marimba back together in time for the performance, which he then spent worrying whether his instrument would fall apart again. But now, thanks to the $100,000 Farmers Insurance Thank America’s Teachers grant the Adamson band received yesterday, broken instruments will be a problem of the past. And for students such as Reynoso, new instruments for the school band means focusing on what matters…

Corporations and civic organizations collaborated to provide on-the-job learning last summer to more than 300 Dallas students as part of the Mayor’s Intern Fellows Program. Thanks to a $175,000 donation from JPMorgan Chase & Co., at least 50 additional opportunities will be available this summer. A host of dignitaries, along with Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings and Dallas ISD Superintendent Michael Hinojosa, participated in a special kick-off event on Nov. 30 at North Dallas High School. The goal of the event was to encourage qualified students to register for the 2016 edition of the Mayor’s Intern Fellows Program. Hinojosa, in a…

As students filed into the Adelle Turner Elementary School cafeteria, they ran over to the empty tables topped with college pennants from schools across the country. Excited third-, fourth- and fifth-graders rapidly discussed where they planned to go college—Texas A&M, University of Texas, and the University of Chicago were among the top choices. “Oh, I want to be a Longhorn,” said one fourth-grade boy. “Well, I’m going to Prairie View A&M University,” another student emphatically replied. The students then sat down to draw and color their own pennants provided by the African American Success Initiative (AASI), a program aimed at closing…