So Bonnie Cain more or less gets chased out of Pearland, and Waco ISD thinks it's a good idea to sign her up for a million dollar contract while they are trying to trim 3.5 million from the budget. If this action alone isn't enough to drive parents to bounce Pat Atkins and his cronies out of office, here's more. Pat and company approved Cain's plan to close 9 campuses to save 3.5 million, after Cain has been spening money on new administrators. But what everyone fails to realize to save this 3.5 million in closing school, that Waco ISD is then going to have to spend another 17 million to add to the remaining schools to handle the increased populations at the campuses. To save 3.5 million, they are going to spend 17. Or in simple math 3.5 -17 = -13.5. No wonder they are trying to dumb down our kids so they won't be able to figure that out that Waco ISD is going in the hole 13.5 million dollars. Today she is taking away our schools. Tomorrow she will want a new bond to cover her 17 million dollar patch to a 3.5 million dollar problem.

Cain should have never had a chance to make decisions to WISD. Campuses are going to be overcrowded. Where is all the tax dollars going every year? I am beginning to believe that embezzlement is happening with in the WISD organization. I am relocating before it gets any worse. My tax dollars need to go elsewhere and for better education. The parents should have gather in the masses and spoke up instead of allowing WISD to walk all over us. Several voices cannot make a difference we needed a hundred thousand. WISD BOARD SUCKS!

Not a resident of Waco/Hewitt anymore, but I keep up with the news because it's more entertaining than a lot of tv shows. Since these moves were in regards to budget cuts, I put the blame on people from the top down. Starting with Mr. GQ, I thought I had a chance to be president, Rick Perry. Face the facts folks. He didn't have Texas public education's best interest in mind when he ran for re-election. This is just the fallout from that. Perry didn't fend for the the teachers or public education because he thought he would be measuring drapes for the White House, so he left them out in the cold. Waco is in a big mess right now. Schools closing, Post office distribution site closing. Man, I bet this area is missing Chet Edwards right about now. Regardless, it's a bad scenario for all kids going to Waco public schools. No matter how this superintendent shuffles the deck, kids in Waco are still gonna be dealt a losing hand. I also blame WISD school board. They are reactive instead of proactive. I said it before and I'll say it now. Midway ISD is the best thing going in central Texas. People talk about recession and cutting back and everything, but quality education is how you beat poverty. Even in these lean times, people are looking towards private schools. In hindsight, people should have voted for Bill White for governor.

Just another classic example of local and national government administrators in charge who don't have a clue what they're doing. People running our government and tons of school "administrators" that come in and explode their respective budgets by spending, spending, spending without any concern about whether things can be paid for. Then, when realizing that they've overstepped their bounds, say it's necessary now to close this and that to save money that they should not have spent in the first place putting the blame on everyone but themselves making the nation, innocent children, and parents suffer the consequences. Live within your means. Stay within your BUDGETS. Quit ruining this country. This goes for the President, Congress, and all local school administrators.

The saddest part of this whole thing is how the school board, faculty, staff and especially the parents just rolled over as Cain and her thugs massacred the district. Instead of emulating two of the best performing schools, they shut them down. Several members of the school board are up for reelection this year. If any good can come from last nights vote, it would be that the people use it as a referendum to throw those bums out on the street where they belong. We need parents on the board, someone with a dog in the fight. There were what appeared to be dissenting voices on the board last night, but by the nights end you could tell it was just political posturing when they did not hesitate to pat themselves on the back when all was said and done. WISD should have made cuts in the administration building first, and quit squandering money on consultants and designing a new website which I'm sure hasn't seen an increase in traffic, just to name a few examples. Viking Hills should have been made into a magnet school for language so that funding could have been provided to the exemplary school. There is a gross misappropriation in funds district wide. Atkins is the president "at-large" how fitting, seeing how his leadership appeared to be missing through this whole debacle. Cain and the board have got to go.

Can't you attach a list of the closures with the story somehow. From reading it I only learn about AJ Moore and Viking Hills. I'm searching around older stories but so far haven't found a list. I'm sure it was done previously and the thinking is we've been there everyone by now should know. But not all of us read every story all the time. It sure would have been nice on the day after such a major development to have the whole story. Frustrating.

I seem to remember, back in the 60's, having neighborhood schools was important.

I agree that the elementary schools are going to be extremely large. Teachers are going to have classes maxed out, and too large for more individualized intruction. Yet, they will still have to have high quality instruction as needed to pass the STAAR exam. Cain is doing just what our school board hired her to do. #1-close schools, #2-get rid of teachers, and then she can retire somewhere far away and not have to deal with the fall out! She has no ties to our community, and is ignorant to the fact that Waco is not Pearland, and has a high poverty rate, along with a high minority population. If you strongly disagree with all of the nonsense, show up and have a voice. Teachers can not speak without the fear of losing our jobs. We just have to go with the flow, and pray to God our parents get a voice. Parents you have a right to be heard. Speak up!!! The Board meeting is Thursday night at 7. Be there early to get a seat and get on the audience for guest list. WISD is one of the only districts in the area resorting to closing schools.

None of what WISD is doing makes sense! I saw the proposal for closing schools this week. Dr. Cain wants to close Brook Avenue at the end of next year and transfer part of those students to Provident Heights, adding to the ones that will have transferred from North Waco at the end of this year! The long range plan for Provident Heights is to have almost 700 students on a campus that is surrounded by three one-way streets! Who is the brilliant engineer and architect that dreamed this up? I know children that attended Provident Heights back when they had their dismissal and car pick up in the front. I had to pick them up on several occasions. I can't tell you how many wrecks or almost wrecks there were when traffic was backed up through 25th and Bosque while waiting to get into the front driveway of the school! And now the superintendent and school board want to practically double the size of the school and go back to a front of school dismissal?? In addition, they also want to take out their school garden and put in more parking and another drop off area at the CORNER of 25th and Homan? I think someone has lost their mind! Maybe several someones if the city approves these changes to traffic flow!! I think I'll just move out of Waco and avoid WISD schools all together rather than send my children to an overcrowded, land-cramped school. Good luck WISD, but my family and my tax dollars are going elsewhere!

Homeschooling is a good alternative if a parent has time to facilitate it. It is relatively inexpensive and I have seen the difference in home-schooled kids attitudes. Mardel Christian Education has all the supplies, as do other places I guess. <><

Victoria I.S.D. has about the same number of students as Waco. Yet, they are not closing schools but actually adding teachers. A W.I.S.D. trustee and administrator admitted to me that the district could have used its funds more efficiently in the past. The TEA website identified three things that parents desire for their schools. #1 smaller campuses, #2 a choice in the schools where their children attend, #3 challenging place where their students can learn. The present proposal offers at best one of the three. Dr. Nika Davis W.I.S.D. School Board Candidate

...life ain't easy for a boy named Sue. Times are hard right now and sacrifices, as sad as they may be, are needed -- by everyone. The economic times we are in have hurt many people, including my family. All have to toughen up right now; that is what sacrifice is. Give it to Our Lord to handle, for He will. (Psalm 37:4-5).

I think that it is sad that so many of the elementary schools are being closed. YES, some of them are getting old and do need to be closed but NORTH WACO Elementary is NOT that old. It was built in the late 1980's. Teachers are being FORCED to retire due to budget cuts when they did not want to. Administrators from downtown RARELY if ever enter classrooms to support the teachers. C-scope curriculum is NOT teaching the students what they need to be successful. It is an expensive piece of do-nothing trash. WISD can find better ways to balance the budget in many places than where they are cutting now. START by cutting C-scope. It is FULL of mistakes and does not addess the needs of our students.

Cain is a news/publicity hound and doesn't want the public's views...just for show. She wasted a million on her relative-owned Lead Your Schools program. Ask her why not only doesn't she cut admin positions in the wake of this, but adds to. She is also planning to use a form of segregation by letting all the so called GT kids go to Tennyson , thanks to her showing favoritism to the Dupuy's and their friends. It's time to vote out Atkins and the other phoneys on the board who know nothing about running schools.

I understand that the school board is in a tough spot because of the lack of state funding, but I hate to see WISD moving to large elementary schools. I think large schools frequently can be intimidating to children. Economy of scale doesn't neatly apply to education of children. When the staff have to tag the children with IDs in order to know whether they belong in that school, then the child tends not to feel like they belong.