SNYDER, Texas– Snyder ISD will meet with a commissioner in Austin on Thursday to discuss the closure of Snyder Junior High.
On Wednesday, Snyder ISD acknowledged in a statement that they received enough petitions required to close the campus and were eager to discuss options with the commissioner in Austin. You can red the full statement at the bottom of the story.
Dawn Thomas has a son that went to Snyder Junior High. She said the quality of education at the school was very poor.
“They’re looking more toward behavior than actually teaching the kids,” Thomas said.
Thomas said her son is autistic. He is an eighth grader learning at a kindergarten level. She said her son would get suspended quite frequently due to behavior, although he has a developmental disorder.
“He was losing his education and not learning anything,” Thomas said.
Thomas decided she would home school her son instead.
“K-12 home schooling is the best thing I have ever done,” Thomas said.
Bobby Thompson, a Snyder resident, said he believes the school should stay open.
“My opinion is they don’t need to close the school down,” Thompson said. “They need to do something maybe about the school board members, trying to get a little better teaching quality or little better pay where they can have better teaching quality.”
Thompson said if the school were to be closed, it would affect the other schools as well.
“Ira and Hermleigh can’t really accomodate them because they’re a small schools and there’s no way we could put all those kids in those two schools, Thompson said.
Below is the statement that was posted on Snyder ISD’s Facebook page Wednesday:
Dr. Bland, along with Board of Trustees President, Ralph Ramon, and Board of Trustees Vice President, Brad Hinton will be in Austin tomorrow, November 7th, to meet with Commissioner Morath. We received a letter today, November 6, 2019, from the Commissioner. The letter states his intention to appoint a Board of Managers and a Conservator to the district. The letter also indicates if the superintendent submits to the Commissioner a petition that the superintendent has certified as a valid petition on or before December 2, 2019, and reflects that the parents of a majority of the students enrolled at Snyder Junior High request that the commissioner close the campus or install a board of managers, the commissioner must order the action requested. See Tex. Educ. Code §39A. 112(b). However, if authorized by a majority of the board of trustees in a meeting conducted in compliance with the Texas Open Meetings Act, the board may request that the commissioner take a different action than the action requested in the parent petition. If the board takes such an action, it must provide a written explanation of the basis for the board’s request to the commissioner no later than December 16, 2019. See Tex. Educ. Code §39A. 112(b).
We did receive the required number of petitions to close the campus and are eager to discuss options with the Commissioner tomorrow. To obtain the latest news and updates, please be sure to “like” the Snyder ISD facebook page, visit us online at snyderisd.net, or subscribe to mobile notifications by downloading the “Snyder ISD Tigers App” available for iPhone or Android.
On behalf of Snyder ISD, we want to thank you for your concern, time, and input in recent weeks. While our district is facing significant changes in the upcoming school year, we believe in Snyder ISD, and we are confident that by working together, we can embrace this opportunity to transform our district to best meet the needs of all of our students.
