South San Antonio ISD board begins five-year priority-setting under Lone Star governance

The South San Antonio Independent School District Board of Managers on Thursday held a workshop focused on adopting a Lone Star governance implementation plan and setting district priorities for the next five years.

The session, led by Lone Star governance coach Ben Mackey and superintendent and district staff, laid out an implementation timeline and three required student-outcome goals under Texas law: third-grade reading, third-grade math and college, career and military readiness (CCMR). Board members discussed target measures, monitoring approaches and recommended constraints intended to protect district values while preserving superintendent discretion.

Ben Mackey, the Lone Star governance coach, told the board the priority-setting process is “arguably the most important job of a board,” and described the three-step Lone Star framework as: set priorities, align systems to those priorities and monitor progress. He said the implementation plan will be posted to the district website and brought back as a board item for formal adoption.

The district academic team recommended specific five-year targets. In classroom terms, staff recommended the board adopt a domain-1 index target (an index derived from STAAR “Approaches/Meets/Masters” percentages) of roughly 60 for third-grade reading and third-grade math by 2030. A presentation identified last year’s third-grade STAR reading “meets” rate at about 32% and third-grade math “meets” at about 30%; staff said those figures translate to a domain-1 index in the mid-30s today. The administration also recommended raising South San Antonio ISD’s CCMR rate from a recent 61% to 90% by 2030.

“By 2030 we want to increase the percentage of third grade students who achieve meets or higher on STAR reading from 32 percent to 60 percent,” an academic staff presenter said, and described the measures the district would use for interim checks, including unit assessments, interim benchmarks and classroom exit tickets. On CCMR the presenter said the district will use TEA data, Skyward and counselor tracking reports to monitor progress.

Board members discussed whether to define the reading and math goals as a single “meets or higher” rate or as the domain-1 index (the administration recommended the index). After small-group and full-board discussion the board broadly favored the administration’s recommendation to use the domain-1 index approach for both third-grade reading and third-grade math to align with the exit criteria and corrective-action plan overseen by the Texas Education Agency.

Board members also agreed to add a district-level literacy focus at the high-school level, specifically monitoring English I and English II outcomes, citing the weight those courses carry in district accountability and the size of the high-school student cohort. Several trustees said addressing high-school literacy is likely to move district accountability metrics more quickly than additional middle-tier goals.

The board discussed student subgroups — including bilingual (multilingual) and special education students — and the risk that an index or single-district goal could mask persistent subgroup gaps. Some members urged that subgroup progress be tracked explicitly even if subgroup targets are not elevated to board-level goals at this time. Administrators responded that compliance and subgroup monitoring are part of the district’s regular accountability work and will be included in progress reports.

Administrators proposed four superintendent constraints (actions the board would not permit) tied to values the board identified: use of non‑grade‑level or non‑aligned instructional materials; permitting ineffective professional learning clusters during the school day; allowing low‑performing schools to be led by low‑performing principals; and allowing campuses to have inequitable access to effective teachers. Trustees refined wording and asked staff to return with draft, board‑ready language.

Board members directed the superintendent and staff to draft precise goal and constraint language and concrete progress measures for the board to review; the superintendent said that draft will be returned to the full board in coming weeks for further wordsmithing and formal action in September. The board also discussed next steps on board operating procedures and the superintendent-evaluation process and signaled a preference to work on those items together as a full board rather than delegating them to a committee.

The meeting concluded with a procedural motion to adjourn that was seconded and carried by voice vote.

The board’s next steps are for administration to translate the workshop decisions into draft goal language, specific interim metrics and monitoring cadence and to return to the board with a proposed monitoring calendar and draft operating-procedures language for consideration.