Crowley ISD Boardroom Rewind

Click here to view the 2024-25 approved calendar.

The Crowley ISD Board of Trustees approved "Draft A" of the 2024-25 calendar for schools that follow a traditional schedule that includes no changes to school day start and end times.

The decision came after a survey of more than 1,400 parents/guardians, employees and students on two versions of the calendar.

Draft A was liked overall by 65% of respondents as compared to 35% who disliked it.

2024-25 School Calendar (Now Approved)

No change to school day start/end times

Student/Staff Days:

• 169 student instructional days
• 187 teacher contract days
• 15.5 professional development days
• 2.5 teacher-directed staff workdays

Draft B was liked overall by 48% of those surveyed and disliked by 52%. Draft B would have added minutes to the school day and provided additional days for parent/teacher conferences and designated campus collaboration days.

Now that the traditional calendar is approved, the district will finalize the calendars for Additional Days School Year (ADSY) campuses and the Crowley Collegiate Academy.

The new Crowley Montessori Academy building will open in the fall of 2024.

Photos Above: Students in the Crowley Montessori Academy will have a new building to call home beginning in the fall of 2024.

Trustees approved naming the district's newest elementary campus Crowley Montessori Academy.

The new school is located in the Karis development off Industrial Boulevard in Crowley and will house the Crowley ISD's Montessori program. It will open in the fall of 2024.

Photos Above: Superintendent Dr. Michael McFarland and Chief Operations Officer Randy Reaves provided a live video tour of the new Crowley Montessori Academy building for students and staff as part of a Career Day presentation on Friday.

QUICK FACTS

• The state's $32.7 billion budget surplus is the result of local property tax surplus, and $0 was allocated to increase the basic allotment for students.
  

• No increase to basic allotment since 2019

• Inflation rate of 19% since 2019

• 44 states fund based on enrollment, Texas is 1 of 6 to fund based on attendance

• Since 2019, student population has steadily increased from 15,728 to 16,729 (+1,001).

• Since 2019, the basic allotment of $6,160 has not increased while the cost of education continues to increase.

• Since 2019, we are educating 1,942 more school-dependent children than before the pandemic.

• Last year, there was a 1,912-student difference between ADA of 14,816 and Enrollment of 16,729.
  
• The lack of funding based on enrollment cost CISD between $11.78 million and $19.07 million.

Like all Texas public school districts, Crowley ISD is facing a legislative-created structural deficit from the Legislature's failure to increase funding despite a $32.7 billion budget surplus and an inflation rate that has spiked to 19% since 2019.

While committed to high-quality instruction and experiences for students, Crowley ISD will need to dive deeper into cost-cutting and revenue-generating measures to protect its financial health.

Superintendent Dr. Michael McFarland assured trustees at their meeting Thursday night that the focus during this process will be to protect what happens in the classroom first, while also striving to treat the staff of Crowley ISD with "courtesy, dignity, respect and professionalism." However, with about 85% of the CISD budget allocated for staffing, people will likely be impacted, he said.

"The challenges we're going to talk about tonight are challenges that were not necessarily created by us but are challenges that we're willing to face," McFarland said. "We're not here to complain. We're going to deal with it."

McFarland and Chief Financial Officer Leon Fisher detailed the strategies the district already has implemented and will implement to mitigate the current fiscal crisis Texas public schools are facing.

The district already has instituted a discretionary spending freeze, a hiring freeze on all vacant positions and recoded certain personnel and expenditures to be funded through external grants. The district also plans to reduce stipend allocations, refine staffing guidelines and reorganize Central Office.

The district and campuses also will evaluate expenses with a Budget Reduction Decision Matrix that looks at the impact cuts might have on items such as student achievement, teachers and staff and plans set forth in Vision 2025. The district and campuses will also look at other revenue sources, such as grants.

"This is real," McFarland said. "It impacts people. It impacts lives. it impacts livelihoods, and we are being strategic at how we approach it."

"We want to make sure we don’t cut things that we value. We want to prioritize those things that we value and then we figure out how to be more efficient and effective at providing high-quality instruction," McFarland said.

In addition to the recent legislative inaction, Texas also is one of a handful of states nationwide that bases funding on attendance instead of enrollment, which creates budgeting challenges for districts that must be prepared for the number of students enrolled.

In 2023, if the state funded Crowley ISD based on enrollment instead of attendance, the district could have received anywhere from $11.7 million to $19 million in additional funding.

District leaders also reiterated that the voter-approved $1.04 billion bond passed in May 2023 cannot be used to help offset the budget shortfall because of the restrictions placed on how that money can be used. For example, it cannot be used to help pay for teacher salaries.

Further budget conversations will happen after Spring Break, including with the community. The community also is invited to take the district's Budget Survey to help CISD better understand what the community prioritizes.

View the full Budget Presentation.

(L-R): June W. Davis, board member; Nedra Robinson, board secretary;

Kelicia Stevenson, board member; Superintendent Dr. Michael D. McFarland;

Dr. La Tonya Woodson-Mayfield, board president; Gary Grassia, board first vice president

Dr. Mia Hall, second vice president ; Daryl R. Davis II, board member;

MEETING VIDEO: To watch a recording of this meeting, please click here.

Previous Board Summaries