According to a report by the Houston Chronicle on August 12th, a high school teacher from the Houston Independent School District became popular online after posting a video on social media. In the video, he said that several of his students were having difficulties with reading and writing on the second day of the new school year.
High school teacher Darius Williams said that he teaches advanced students at Whitley High School in Houston's Fifth Ward. He mentioned that on Tuesday, he assigned students a basic writing task: to read two sentences and write one sentence themselves. He lamented that he had used time to explain each question and discuss possible answers with the students, but even so, many students still couldn't complete a single sentence of writing.
Williams said he cried on the spot.
These children were seventeen or eighteen years old, not even able to fill in four words," William said in the video. "I've already told them the answer before they even saw the title but still, they couldn't write it down."
Whitley High School failed under the state accountability system for seven consecutive years, which led to its takeover by the state government due to the Houston Independent School District. Since then, the school's performance has improved to a B level, but the students' STAAR test scores remain at 69 points, which is considered a D level. STAAR is an annual standardized test that all students in public schools in Texas must take from the third grade until high school graduation.
According to media reports from Texas, the Houston Independent School District was officially taken over by the Texas Education Agency (TEA) in 2023 due to long-term poor academic performance and other issues. This is the largest school district takeover in the state to date. One of the key factors leading to this situation was Whitley High School, which failed to meet standards in the state assessment system for seven consecutive years. Additionally, a survey conducted by the state government in 2019 found that members of the Houston Independent School District's board of directors had violated several laws.
The so-called “takeover” involves dissolving the elected school boards and superintendents, and appointing new district administrators and management teams.
The superintendent appointed by the governor, Mike Myers, has brought 130 schools in the Houston Independent School District under the "new education system." Whitley High School is one of them. This reform model provides additional funding and personnel support for schools that have historically performed poorly, along with standardized curricula and strict time-based teaching schedules. Since then, the Houston Independent School District has made progress in almost every grade and subject that participates in the annual exams. However, its reading education methods have also received criticism.
Whitley High School. The image is from the Houston Chronicle.
Some critics point out that schools rely too heavily on short text segments generated by artificial intelligence in compulsory courses, while there is a serious lack of reading of full storybooks and novels.
The video was posted and immediately sparked intense discussions online.
A teacher who claimed to have educated these children criticized Williams harshly, saying that he was "using these students to gain attention," and also stated that "these students do not have these problems."
However, some netizens express doubts about this. One netizen said, "The teachers are likely to let them pass all the time, because they don't want to cause trouble for their parents."