TEA should dial back oversight of DeSoto schools, conservator says

The state should loosen its oversight of DeSoto schools, the person appointed to intervene in the embattled school district said.

AJ Crabill — who was brought in by the Texas Education Agency to help turn DeSoto ISD around after financial mismanagement and poor governance — said at this week’s school board meeting that the district is ready for him to step down.

Crabill has worked as the district’s conservator since 2020 when the state’s takeover gave him power over school board and superintendent decisions.

During Monday’s school board meeting, Crabill announced the end of his tenure, noting that he intends to complete his term by Dec. 31.

“Over the past three years, DeSoto ISD has grown significantly in the areas of academics, talent and governance,” he told trustees. “While the work of uplifting DeSoto ISD remains an ongoing endeavor, the portion of that work for which I, personally, can be most helpful — restoring acceptable levels of effectiveness in these key areas of school system leadership — is complete.”

He said the job of continuing to improve DeSoto ISD is best accomplished by the work of an effective local board and superintendent — not a conservator.

It’s ultimately up to Education Commissioner Mike Morath to extend or end a conservatorship. It’s unclear when that decision will be made.

“TEA appreciates Conservator Crabill’s service to the students, staff, and community of DeSoto ISD and appreciates his feedback regarding the scope of further intervention and support in the district,” Texas Education Agency spokesman Jake Kobersky said in a statement.

The district improved its financial rating and academic success in recent years. DeSoto was slapped with a D academic rating from the state in 2018; it earned a B in 2022, the latest round of accountability grades.

The district is under fresh leadership: trustees selected Usamah Rodgers, a former deputy chief in Dallas ISD, as the new superintendent in the spring of 2022.

“The improvements speak for themselves,” Crabill said.

Trustees celebrated the district’s positive turn during Monday night’s meeting. Their mood was a far cry from the bitter infighting and division DeSoto families saw during school board meetings in earlier years.

Trustee DeAndrea Fleming thanked Crabill for his work, saying it wasn’t easy for him to come into a place dealing with dysfunction and frustration.

“You will leave a piece of DeSoto a lot better than you found it when you came,” she said.

To the trustees now steering DeSoto, Crabill said: “You all did not have to embrace me as a partner in this work, but you did. Your students and I have both been blessed because of it.”

The district remains under a separate conservator, who was appointed earlier this year to focus on mitigating financial issues. Crabill said this decision came after the district overestimated its enrollment for the 2022-23 school year, which created new financial hurdles.

Crabill’s decision will not impact the placement of the financial conservator.

Financial woes were among the reasons DeSoto ISD was placed under a conservator in 2020. Years earlier, sloppy bookkeeping and lavish spending triggered a $21.6 million budget shortfall for the district that resulted in deep staff cuts.

Intervention in DeSoto began after a 2020 TEA investigation report found that former administrators made costly purchases with little oversight from the elected board, including $330,000 in purchases to fictitious merchants.

After the investigation came to light, the district faced leadership whiplash. At one point in 2020, the trustees accepted a former superintendent’s resignation and then reinstated him shortly after.

The TEA’s intervention in DeSoto wasn’t faced with the same backlash as another more recent — and more intense — takeover. In Houston ISD, Morath appointed a new superintendent, former Dallas ISD leader Mike Miles, and board of managers to oversee the state’s largest school district. That sparked widespread community outrage.