Security:
Wes Boyd, Director of Information Resources, has recently completed an RFP for enhanced security cameras all across the district. This plan would place 133 cameras at a cost of $190,000. This will be an item on the February board meeting for consideration.

DATE Grant, Cycle 1

· The TEA ordered certain changes in our DATE, Cycle 1, Continuation Grant. While most of the changes were strictly minor editing concerns there was one change which could affect Part 1, Teacher Awards. That change has to do with the baseline data to which the target data will be compared. The baseline data was originally the 08-09 TAKS scores. This baseline data was changed to the results of the first benchmark tests of 09-10. The target has remained the same: students at 90% TAKS OR improvement to 90% of the difference between benchmark scores and TAKS 90% passing rate. This change is a bit less stringent than the way the grant was originally written.

PK-16

· Twenty Tatum High School students participated in the Annual Youth Leadership Conference held at LeTourneau University on January 19. This year's theme, Taking the Risk..Guided by Principle, focused on the leadership style of approaching uncertain situations with courage and utilization of "out of the box" thinking to resolve issues. Risk takers, while needing courage to take risks, need to make decisions guided by sound principles. LeTourneau University students conducted these sessions based on the Harvard Graduate School Leadership Model. A great day, enjoyed by all that attended!

· THS has worked in collaboration with Texas A&M University to set up a "College Capable Seminar" on a Saturday, February 20 for four hours. The seminar will be held in the community room from 10:00 until 12:00 with a break for lunch and then 1:00-3:00. The sessions will be filled by a first come basis. THS will pay a portion of the cost for our own students but this will be opened to the public so be sure if you are interested in your student attending you pay to get their name on the list in the THS office. It is very appropriate for sophomores, juniors and seniors who are planning to attend college after high school. It is also good study information for the remainder of high school as well. This is something that students really need to be taught.

Morning Session

• How to stop procrastination cold. No more putting it off until it's too late. That means better grades and no more late nights!
• The quick and dirty secret to remembering more in less time. HINT: You're working too hard!
• The lazy way to learn. The proven way to actually spend less time studying each semester yet learn it better than ever.

Afternoon Session

• The secret to taking power notes that really stick in your brain. You'll get more studying done during class than most people will do all week!
• The simple method to cut reading down to a manageable level. HINT: Less is more!
• How to get rid of the highlighter. Read it once and only once, yet get better grades.

In the Legislature (Reprinted from various sources)

· Today, Lt. Governor David Dewhurst and Texas House Speaker Joe Straus (San Antonio) announced appointments to the Select Committee on Public School Finance Weights, Allotments and Adjustments. The state's goal of post-secondary readiness and a continued focus on accountability and closing the achievement gap between socioeconomic groups are important to the future of Texas students and the state’s economic health. The committee will review the 20-year-old funding formulas to ensure alignment moving forward. Lt. Governor Dewhurst's legislative appointees are: committee co-chair Sen. Florence Shapiro (R-Plano), Sen. Robert Duncan (R-Lubbock), Sen. Dan Patrick (R-Houston), and Sen. Royce West (D-Dallas). Dr. Leonard Culwell (Garland), superintendent of schools, Garland Independent School District, will serve as the public school community member. Dr. Harrison Keller, Vice Provost for Higher Education Policy and Research, will serve as a representative from the business community. "Few issues are more critical to the future of Texas than the quality of our public schools and the education they provide to our young people. I expect the members of this committee to engage the public and come up with the best ideas to ensure that Texas is using taxpayers funds responsibly to provide our students with a world-class education," said Lt. Gov. Dewhurst. The legislative appointees from the Texas House of Representatives are Representatives Jimmie Don Aycock (R-Killeen), Rob Eissler (R-The Woodlands), Scott Hochberg (D-Houston) and Mike Villarreal (D-San Antonio). Representative Rob Eissler will serve as co-chair of the Select Committee. Dr. Richard Middleton (San Antonio), superintendent of schools, North East Independent School District and adjunct professor of public school finance at Trinity University, will serve as the public school community member. Larry Kellner (Houston), President of Emerald Creek, a private investment firm and former CEO, Continental Airlines, will serve as the member from the business community. Speaker Straus said, "I am confident the work of the Select Committee on Public School Finance will help the legislature align funding formulas with the goals of innovation and post secondary readiness. Every child in Texas public schools deserves a quality education. While we fund important priorities, we must also ensure that we use each taxpayer dollar wisely." The Select Committee on Public School Finance Weights, Allotments and Adjustments will engage the public in thoughtful discussions on topics that touch every Texan – public education and appropriate stewardship of taxpayer resources. These important discussions during this legislative interim will lay the groundwork for funding decisions during the 2011 session. During the 2009 legislative session, the Select Committee on Public School Finance Weights, Allotments and Adjustments was established to conduct a comprehensive review of funding formulas under the public school finance system. The committee will conduct a series of public hearings throughout the state and solicit information from parents of public school children and other community members. At least one public hearing will also be held at a public school to include students in the discussion. The Select Committee will release a report to the Legislature by December 1, 2010.

· For months now, we've been hearing the comptroller report that state revenue collections have dropped dramatically as the national recession caught up with the Texas economy. For several years, we've known that the school property-tax cuts passed in 2006 would not be fully replaced, as promised, with revenue from the new state business-franchise tax passed that year. When you hear folks talking about a structural state budget shortfall, that's generally what they've been talking about. This "structural shortfall" terminology also has been applied lately to the use of one-time federal stimulus funding to cover the cost of ongoing programs--for now. For decades, state lawmakers have failed to come up with a sustainable revenue structure that would grow along with the state's rising population and growing needs. That's another kind of structural budget shortfall less often noticed but of crucial importance. It's the underlying reason why the state's school-finance system periodically plunges into constitutional crisis over the inadequacy and inequity of education funding. Now all these state fiscal trends have come together to pose a huge budget challenge for state lawmakers in the 2011 legislative session. In response, just in the last week, three key developments occurred at the state legislature.

• January 12: House Speaker Joe Straus, Republican of San Antonio, announced the creation of a House Select Committee on Fiscal Stability. His press release announcing the panel's formation stated: "Declining revenues and other major budgetary demands will substantially strain the state's budget next cycle. The committee will assess Texas' ability to meet its current and future budget obligations and analyze whether the shortfall is due to the current recession alone or more systemic problems." Straus said: "The Texas House of Representatives is taking a comprehensive approach to solving the potential budget shortfall in a time of reduced revenue. Fiscally responsible work we do today will put Texas in better shape tomorrow."
• January 13: At a little-noted hearing of the Texas House Ways and Means Committee in Houston, it became clearer just how hard that "fiscally responsible work" will be. Analysts at the Legislative Budget Board estimated that the state in the next biennium will have at least $10.8 billion less than the amount lawmakers used to make ends meet for 2010-2011. That shortfall exceeds the entire amount likely to be available in the state Rainy Day Fund (likely to total $9.6 billion). And the estimated shortfall doesn't even include the potential impact of factors such as shrinking property values or rapid enrollment growth--let alone the cost of meeting long-neglected needs.
• January 15: The Republican state leadership triumvirate--Gov. Rick Perry, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst, and Speaker Straus--instructed state agencies to come up with proposed cuts of 5 percent of their current budgets to be implemented in the current biennium. They explicitly exempted from this requirement funding for Medicaid and the Children's Health Insurance Program, the Foundation School Program formula funding that school districts depend on, and funding for the retirement programs run by the Teacher Retirement System and Employees Retirement System.