Education

Wednesday is the start of pre-enrollment for San Antonio’s new early childhood education initiative, Pre-K 4 SA. 700 students in total will be selected for the inaugural classes at the two model education centers, located on the northwest and southeast sides of town.

The city changed the dates and locations of pre-enrollment, which is now scheduled to run through May 9.

The city is in the middle of a week-long list of events to motivate residents of all ages - from elementary to high school and beyond - to go to college.

On Monday, Mayor Julián Castro reminded people on the steps of City Hall about the city’s commitment to education.

"San Antonians set a bold goal," he said. "That goal was to make the biggest turnaround in educational achievement any big city has seen in a decade."

Veteran educator Kathy Bruck has been chosen to lead Pre-K 4 SA as the program's interim CEO.

With nearly 40 years of experience in early learning, Bruck said her job in leading Pre-K 4 SA through its infant phases will effect students, teachers, and parents, not only within the Pre-K 4 SA model education centers, but in districts and schools throughout San Antonio.

The Toyota USA Foundation announced it will contribute $100,000 to the annual CORE4 STEM Expo for students studying science, technology, engineering, and math.

toyota USA National Vice-President Pat Pineda said by 2018, 1.2 million STEM jobs will go unfilled.

"That’s because we don’t have enough people that have the requisite skills, and I think unfortunately we all know that this is a particularly acute problem in the Latino community," Pineda said.

UTSA has acquired a Rice University professor to lead its top-ranked business school through the next decade of San Antonio. 

Dr. William Gerard Sanders has been named Bodenstedt Chair of the College of Business. Sanders launched a PhD program in strategic management at Rice University, where he has served for the last 5 years, and in the previous 12 years served as a department chair and faculty member at Brigham Young University.

As the Northside Independent School District ends its coordinated kindergarten registration, the district is expected to hit record enrollment for five year olds and finally top more than 100,000 students beginning next year.

When schools starts this fall the district will have 101,600 students.  

For the past week the district has been encouraging parents to enroll their five year olds for the 2013-14 school year. Northside expects to enroll a record 7,700 kindergartners, which spokesman Pascual Gonzalez said it is a barometer for future years.

The public got their first chance to see and touch the curriculum being considered for the Pre-K 4 SA early childhood education measure.

Four programs are on the table for consideration by the Pre-K 4 SA curriculum committee, including options from Pearson Publishing’s OWL (Opening the World of Learning) and Scholastic , but first they wanted to see what people thought of the materials.

Days after the San Antonio Independent School District named a candidate for the district's top job, Dr. Manuel Isquierdo withdrew his name from consideration.

Monday, the SAISD School Board voted to name Isquierdo the "lone finalist" for the position.

SAISD School Board President Ed Garza announced the move Friday afternoon, saying Isquierdo felt the decision was in the best interest of all parties involved.

The lone finalist for the superintendent position at San Antonio Independent School District is under fire for his previous record, which includes a tax lien, a suspended license and charging money to a district credit card.

Manuel Isquierdo does not come to SAISD with a clean financial record, but he did have explanations for each of his accusations.

After a complaint from the San Antonio Independent School District, the Texas Education Agency has suspended or put on probation several tutoring agencies that may have committed fraud.

SAISD filed its complaint in February, claiming several tutoring agencies were falsely submitting names of students they may not have tutored for reimbursement of more than $280,000.

The TEA maintains a list of more than 100 tutoring companies that are entitled to receive school district funds as part of the No Child Left Behind Act and parents choose from that list.