Texas Charter Schools Association (TCSA) held its quarterly Member Council Meeting last Friday, February 5, 2016. More than 30 attendees representing more than 20 organizations participated in this day-long meeting held at our sponsor’s, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, office in Austin.
After a brief welcome and introductions by TCSA’s Executive Director David Dunn, General Counsel Lindsey Gordon provided legal updates to the group covering a range of topics including the impact of the new Open Carry laws (HB 910) on school campuses and separately, the new Open Meetings Act requirements. Additionally, she provided a briefing on HB 2610; information on the issue concerning the disposition of charter school properties; and the open comment period for proposed rules.
TCSA Members also received a briefing from Veronica Garcia, the Vice President of Government and Public Affairs, on Charter Schools Now, a newly formed 501 (c) (4) non-profit corporation, as well as the current status of TCSA’s advocacy efforts including updates from the Senate Education Interim Hearing which discussed the implementation of SB 2, disposition of property, and public charter school facilities funding.
Laura Kelly, TCSA’s Director of Quality, gave a presentation to members on the TEA’s Charter Schools Performance Framework outlining important deadlines and concerns. As part of the presentation, she walked through a sample report with our members. Following this presentation, Director of Training Services, Paula Moeller provided dates for upcoming training and professional development events and showed the group the newly created Learning Zone, TCSA’s centralized training website. One of the primary training opportunities is TCSA’s Annual Conference which will be held in Austin on October 3-5, 2016. Make sure to sign up for early registration!
TCSA’s members last met in October at the annual conference in San Antonio, so this was an opportune time to share information and best practices, receive updates, and ask questions from the staff. We want to thank our sponsors, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, for hosting the meeting and for their services as one of our solution providers. We encourage all of our members to attend the next Member Council Meeting on April 28, which will be held at the Texas Computer Education Association (TCEA) Conference Center in Austin at no charge for TCSA members. Look for more information on the events section of TCSA’s website.
