President John F. Kennedy radio address 6-11-1963

This is the planned text to the radio address given by President John F. Kennedy on June 11, 1963, within 6 months of his fatal trip to Dallas.  This record is found online at https://www.jfklibrary.org/asset-viewer/archives/JFKPOF/045/JFKPOF-045-005

It merits a historical marker on the Grassy Knoll in Dallas where he was killed just before he entered the Triple Underpass.  It is proposed that walkway on the north side become a Black History timeline from 1963 back to 1853 and the first recorded hanging of a Black person in Dallas, a 53 year old grandmother.  Many deaths followed and must be remembered in Martyr's Park, in the lower left hand corner of this photo of the Triple Underpass construction in 1935.

Tragically this was the image on 11-22-63 as he rapidly dying President Kennedy was rushed to Parkland Hospital.  It is recommended this Historical Marker to his historic radio address go on the patch of grass in front of the walkway to the right of the car carrying President Kennedy to Parkland.

Here is the text from the radio address with a U.S. President finally responding in a moral and more adequate manner to the cries and demands of Black Americans and all minorities for centuries:

Dallas needs to seek out a historical marker to remember this great address an use it as the first exhibit of a Black Timeline going back in Black History to Martyr's Park.

12-19-19 Board Meeting: Summary of 2019 DISD Transparency War

Generally, when I am speaking about STAAR tests or other tests that are made in Texas or Dallas, DISD students are doing well.  However, when those tests are nationwide tests the results tend to be disastrous.

Said another way, when it is easy to "teach to the test" DISD does well. When the testing is on more general abilities and it is harder to "teach to the test" Texas does bad, and DISD does even worse!

That pattern was illustrated painfully with this chart produced by the Dallas Morning News and posted in their 11-7-19 editorial titled "So we are better than Mississippi? Not any more."

These are scores from the National Association for Educational Progress (NAEP).  Added to this Dallas Morning News Chart are the two red lines showing when significant cuts to education in Texas were made in 2011, and when a non-educator was placed as Texas Education Commissioner in January of 2016.   While this chart is made for only African American 8th grade Reading scores, this general pattern of decline applies to all students in Texas and in Dallas.  Below are the NAPE scores for the past decade painfully documenting details of the decline in Dallas ISD.  Of these 20 scores covering the past decade in Dallas only one, a fourth grade math score for 2015, shows an improvement that is statistically significant. There are 12 scores, including all 10 of the Reading scores, that are statistically significant declines.

Finally, here is a summary of the 8th grade African American Reading scores for the nation, Texas, and DISD.  DISD is the worst, Texas is better, and the nation is better than Texas.

Texas must begin to look at how they are doing on nationwide tests more closely as our achievement appears to be the worst ever! 

Creating our own testing system in Texas, that makes us feel good when we teach to the test, is worthless in today's world!  This problem is bigger than DISD, but in Dallas ISD students are apparently suffering from it more than anywhere else in Texas.  Is that due to TEI, the Teacher Excellence Initiative which started in 2015 when the decline in NAEP scores in DISD appears to have accelerated?

Go to www.dallasisd.us to see a listing of Board presentations and other significant statements and studies done regarding Dallas ISD.

Since TEI started in 2015 Dallas ISD NAEP scores have fallen dramatically!

On 11-7-19 the Dallas Morning News published the following chart, edited here, demonstrating how dramatically Texas had fallen with the 2019 scores from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). This is terrible for Texas!  It is even worse for Dallas as Dallas has fallen more than Texas.  the chart printed in the Dallas Morning News Editorial of 11-7-19:

The above chart shows Texas having 8th grade African-American NAEP Reading scores that are "worse than Mississippi." That translates to "The Worst in the Nation!" See the editorial at https://www.dallasnews.com/opinion/editorials/2019/11/17/so-were-better-than-mississippi-not-anymore/

In an earlier article on 10-30-19 about this drop in NAEP scores Dr. Hinojosa stated his problems with the release: "While Hinojosa said he didn’t have a problem with the data, he did have a problem with how it was reported. Even among the 27 urban school systems, DISD had a much higher percentage of high-poverty students and English-Language learners than most of the others, he said.

“When you break it down for the level of poverty, we do pretty well,” Hinojosa said. “But NAEP just puts scores out in larger comparisons, without disaggregating.”  See article at 

https://www.dallasnews.com/news/education/2019/10/30/students-in-dallas-and-fort-worth-continue-to-struggle-on-national-assessments/

My question is in a comparison over time. The DISD demographics have not changed significantly but scores are still going down relative to other cities. The biggest shock is in the link to NAEP 8th grade scores for all Dallas 8th graders of all races compared with the nation and with Texas. In both 2017 and 2019 Dallas declined more than either the nation or Texas! This NAEP data is from https://www.nationsreportcard.gov/reading/districts/scores/?grade=8

Yes, in both the 2017 and 2019 NAEP testing in reading, Dallas 8th graders declined more than either the nation, or Texas!

Below are two more charts from this same NAEP data with the scores over 5 testing cycles covering 10 years for both 4th and 8th grade in math and reading.
The NAEP fourth grade Dallas Math scores have no statistically significant change compared to other large cities except for improvement in 2015. However, in reading Dallas fourth graders suffered statistically significant declines in scores for every one of the 5 tests covering 10 years!

Second, here are the 8th grade math and reading scores for the same period covering 10 years in Dallas. In 8th grade Math only the two most recent scores are statistically significant. Sadly they are declines as compared to other large city schools. In 8th grade Reading all 5 years of testing covering the past decade show scores that reflect a statistically significant decline as compared to other large cities.

Several other patterns are present:
1) Except for Fourth Grade Math, the highest test scores are in 2013 for both grades and subjects.
2) The buildup to TEI in Dallas started in 2013 but was not active until 2015 when the more rapid NAEP scores decline began relative to the rest of Texas.
3) The decline appears to be accelerating and DISD sticks out in Texas as having a worse than average decline in Texas. This is all happening as Texas itself has declining NAEP scores compared to the rest of the US. This only makes it look worse for Dallas.

Are NAEP scores going to be a factor in Dr. Hinojosa's bonus plan?
Are NAEP scores going to be a factor in the assessment of the TEI?
What factors would cause for such dramatically declining NAEP scores covering 4 years to be ignored in answering these questions beyond "It was not in the evaluation plan."