Good morning!  I hope you had a great Memorial Day Weekend and enjoyed the three days.  I know that all of you were ready for it since everyone is so busy at the end of the school year.  It is also a good break before we go into the last two weeks of school as well as graduation season.  Memorial Day is always a very special day in which we honor those who have given their lives in service to our country.  I know growing up it was always a special day to my father who served in World War II.  He was a Second Lieutenant in the U.S. Army who trained many soldiers who went overseas in the war, of which many lost their lives.  We all know of someone who gave their life in service to our country, and we need to take time to recognize the sacrifice they made for us.  As we honored those who have given their lives, we honor all veterans and those currently serving in the Armed Forces.  It is because of their service and sacrifice that we experience the freedoms we have in this country.  Let us not forget, as we are now in the busy days of the end of the school year and enjoyed a long weekend, the true purpose of Memorial Day and honor current and past members of the Armed Forces, and especially those who gave the ultimate sacrifice for our country.

I want to congratulate Northwest Crossing Elementary School on the celebration of their 25^th Anniversary.  Northwest Crossing opened in August of 1982 as NISD's 25^th elementary school.  Last Monday night a program was held honoring the school, the principals who have served that school, and the faculty who have taught there.  It was a great program with the speaker being former principal Bill Bechtol who is currently serving as Assistant Superintendent of Curriculum and Instruction in the Eanes School District.  Congratulations to all the faculty, students, Principal Shirley Thompson, and Vice Principal Paul Moreno on a great program.  The school has served Northside well!

Also this past week we held the Elementary Digital Media Affair on Wednesday night and the Secondary Digital Media Affair on Thursday evening.  I attended both of these and I congratulate Kelly Smith, Assistant Superintendent for Technology Services; Joyce Stevens, Director of Academic Technology Services; her staff; and all the CITs on the awards and the work of the students.  This District is truly a leader in technology and how our students are using technology is amazing.  Awards were given for many categories including areas such as desktop publishing, digital graphics, video, multimedia, and web publishing.  As I presented the awards I saw so much pride the students had in their work.  Thanks to everyone who has a part in the technology aspect of our District for all you do for our students and our school district.  "We Are Northside," and this is certainly exhibited by technology.

Last week we received the initial results of the TAKS testing.  I am very pleased with our scores and I congratulate you and the students on the great results.  In 3^rd grade our reading scores improved to a 95% pass rate with the second administration of the reading test, and the pass rate in math was 88%.  This 88% is an increase from 84% last year.  Our pass rates for fourth grade were 89% in reading, 89% in math, and 95% in writing.  Reading and math were about the same for fourth grade, but writing increased 2 percentage points.  In fifth grade our reading scores were 96% passing and science was 86%.  We have not received the second administration results of fifth grade math, but I am thrilled with the increase from 81% in 2007 to the 86% in 2008 in science for fifth grade.  In sixth grade reading our pass rate was 96% which was an increase of 3% over last year, and the math pass rate was 83% which is also an increase of 3% over last year.  Seventh grade reading had a 90% pass rate, which was a 2% increase over 2007, and math was an 81% pass rate which was a 3% increase.  Writing for seventh grade was 95% which was the same as last year.  In eighth grade our reading pass rate increased to 98% with the second administration, while science had a pass rate of 73%, and social studies 94%.  We have not received the second administration math results for eighth grade, but no doubt they will increase from the 83% rate which was 10 percentage points above last year.  In eighth grade social studies increased 4%, while science dropped 1%.  In ninth grade the reading pass rate was 90% which is the same as last year, and math was 65% which was the same as last year.  At tenth grade the reading pass rate was 92% which was the same as last year, but math dropped 4% from 75% to 71%.  Tenth grade science did improve from 71% to 75%, and social studies stayed the same at 93%.  At eleventh grade our reading pass rate improved 1% over last year to 96%; math stayed the same at 87%; science increased from 87% to 89%; and social studies stayed the same at 98%.  When all the grade levels are combined by subject area our pass rates for the District were 90.3% in reading, 94.7% in writing, 93.3% in social studies, 81.7% in math, and 80.6% in science.  Remember though, math will increase when we receive the results of the second administration in fifth and eighth grade math.  These scores are great and I am very proud of how we continue to improve.  No doubt our challenge is in math and science, but in particular ninth and tenth grade math.  As we further analyze the results we will identify other areas we must focus on.  I am particularly interested in how the sub-population of economically disadvantaged did this year compared to last year since we put a special focus on improving the passing rates in all grade levels and subject areas for this population.  Great work and we will discuss more about these results as we prepare for next year!

As a finalist for the 2007 Broad Prize for Urban Education, Northside received $125,000 in scholarships for 2008 graduating seniors.  On Thursday we received notice that seventeen (17) Northside seniors were selected by the Broad Foundation as scholarship winners.  Broad Prize scholars are eligible for two- or four-year scholarships depending on the type of institution they choose to attend.  Scholarship recipients who enroll in four-year institutions receive $10,000 paid out over four years ($2,500 per year).  Students who enroll in two-year institutions receive $2,500 scholarships paid out over two years ($1,250 per year).  Seventeen students will receive some award of scholarship from these funds.  We will honor these students tonight at our Board meeting, and I congratulate each one of them.

In closing I again want to thank all of you for how hard you work with the many events we have at the end of school.  I know I can't attend all of them, but the ones I do attend are indicative of the wonderful work you do.  Thanks to all the volunteers in the OASIS program who read to and mentor elementary children, and I thoroughly enjoyed the program recognizing these individuals.  Thanks to Susan Underwood for all she does with this program.  What a great program produced by Mead Elementary, "Schoolhouse Rock," and I thank Amanda Wagner, music teacher, for the wonderful performance by the students.  I compliment Villarreal Elementary on their wonderful program "Fiesta Villarreal."  Friday night Wyvonna and I attended the Spring Choir Concert at Marshall High School.  It was David Dyer's last concert since he is retiring, and I want to thank David for the many years he has given to Northside both at Taft High School and Marshall High School.  Great things continue to happen in Northside because "WE ARE NORTHSIDE."  Have a great week!