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On Tuesday, Brownsville ISD welcomed a team from Scholastic to explore partnerships to boost parental involvement and student attendance.
After an initial meeting at BISD headquarters on Price Road, the group headed to Benavidez Elementary, one of the district’s largest elementary schools, where parental and student involvement were evident.
An awards ceremony for students on the A and B honor rolls and for those with perfect attendance preceded the visit. Proud parents and family members filled the cafeteria.
BISD is in the midst of an Every Day Matters campaign to boost attendance. At Benavidez, a student task force is helping make sure the attendance rate is as high as possible heading into snapshot day.
That’s the day the Texas Education Agency takes a snapshot of public school attendance statewide, which determines state funding.
For every student BISD gets $6,160. The amount was approved in 2019 and hasn’t gone up since, so optimum attendance is extra important again this year.
Two Benavidez students, fourth grader Emma Lopez and fifth grader Adriana Lopez are on an Every Day Matters task force to help make sure they and their classmates are in school every day.
As the team from Scholastic arrived, they shared the task force’s ideas to boost attendance with Dwaine Millard, Scholastic’s national director for parental engagement.
Among the ideas:
>> Students who are at school all five days get a coupon for a mystery box from which to choose prizes on Friday.
>> Those students also get to sit on stage in the cafeteria at lunch on Fridays, joining a mystery guest.
Posters adorned hallways, promoting literacy and reading, many with references to books from Scholastic.
