HISD trustees calling for closer look at Apollo
Tuesday, August 6, 2013
HISD Superintendent Terry Grier’s signature school reform program will get a closer look if some trustees get their way.
The school board is scheduled to vote Thursday on an item that would direct Grier to have a forthcoming analysis of the Apollo program reviewed by other researchers. Some critics have questioned whether the analysis, being conducted by Harvard University economics professor Roland Fryer, will be unbiased because Fryer has advised Grier on Apollo.
HISD trustee Juliet Stipeche, working with school board president Anna Eastman, requested the agenda item seeking “independent third-party academic reviews” of Fryer’s evaluation report. Stipeche said the outside reviews wouldn’t necessarily evaluate the effectiveness of Apollo but would analyze the methodology used in the report and its conclusions. She and Eastman said they expected that researchers would conduct the review for free.
Grier, at a school board meeting Monday, said the board needed to take the lead in picking the researchers.
“I’d like to suggest that the board president find someone to do that,” Grier said. “I don’t know how to do this.”
Grier later said that he had no problem with outside reviewers but didn’t want to be accused of bias if he or his