Voters in the San Antonio Independent School District will decide in November whether to support a $450 million bond request that will upgrade facilities throughout the district.
KSAT-TV reports that the bond funds would enable the district to carry out renovations of 13 schools—seven high schools, four middle schools, and two elementary schools. The school board Monday night to place the question on the Nov. 8 ballot.
The work would upgrade aging infrastructure, improve science labs and expand classroom spaces to meet recommended state guidelines and to provide learning space comparable to neighboring districts.
The school board also has placed on the Nov. 8 ballot a request to raise the district's operating levy by 13 cents. The additional revenue would be used to provide technology and other classroom enhancements.
Victoria Moreno Herrera, a member of a Blue Ribbon Task Force Committee that recommended the bond proposal, says committee members were convinced of the need for facility upgrades after touring some of the district's aging campuses.
"It was really, really frightening to think that kids are going into these schools every day and they're expected to learn," says Herrera. "In others, we would tour classrooms, and they would have to repeat or yell and scream so we could hear over the A/C system. Others, it was so hot inside the classrooms some of us had to get up and leave."
Video from KSAT-TV:
