By J. Lyn Carl, GalleryWatch.com
Austin, TX –
Some officials of the Texas Education Agency (TEA) will be spending their Labor Day holiday weekend answering questions via phone relating to getting children evacuated from the Gulf Coast areas hit by Hurricane Katrina into the public schools of Texas.
Debbie Ratcliffe, communications director for TEA, said Saturday that the telephone hotline established to field questions relating to K-12 grade education questions, will be monitored during the upcoming weeks as well.
The hotline number is 1-800-957-5109.
As of Friday, more than 6,100 students from the flood- and storm-ravaged Gulf Coast states had already been enrolled in Texas public schools. The number is expected to grow next week as additional children arrive in Texas seeking refuge.
In a notice on the TEA web site, Texas public school superintendents are urged to both post the toll free number and to announce the number on their after-hour answering services. "We expect parents and educators to be seeking information about Texas public schools throughout the holiday weekend and encourage you to share the toll-free number so that assistance may be offered immediately," TEA officials told the superintendents.
TEA has also established a special web page with Frequently Asked Questions for Texas educators faced with the influx of evacuee schoolchildren who will be seeking entry into their schools. Among the information on the web site are email addresses for retired Texas teachers interested in helping with the additional teaching chores expected and information for those inquiring regarding the donation of school supplies for evacuee children.
On Tuesday, Sept. 6, Texas Education Commissioner Shirley Neeley will release a toll-free number for Louisiana teachers who are seeking employment in Texas schools. The toll-free number will also be manned from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday beginning Tuesday.
Neeley predicted earlier this week that thousands of evacuee schoolchildren will be enrolling in Texas public schools, most of them in the Houston ISD, as Houston has taken in more evacuees than any other city in Texas.
"We will do everything we can to welcome these students and return some form of stability to the lives of these youngsters," Neeley said.
Other actions being taken by the TEA to facilitate the influx of new out-of-state students into the Texas public schools include:
- Providing waivers for the state-mandated 22-2 teacher-to-student class sizes in grades K-4
- Providing additional textbooks for districts with newly-arrived students
- Increased funding for districts with significant increases in the number of evacuee students who qualify for the federal free and reduced price lunch program because they are homeless
- Providing state funding for students who are residents of Texas, no matter how long the length of residence
The number of evacuees headed to Texas from the Gulf Coast states ravaged by the hurricane increases daily. Today, Saturday, hundreds were being evacuated via Amtrack trains to both Houston and Dallas.