Difficult decisions always make some people happy and others disappointed.
Becky listens to everyone.
For every issue that arises in GCISD, there are dozens of opinions. Becky has 12 years of practice balancing stakeholder feedback (advisory committees, open forums, and surveys of teachers, students, parents, and the community) and seeking advice from experts in education, safety, and security.
Becky opposes cuts that would harm their readiness, and wholeheartedly disagrees with keeping education to the “basic” minimum.
Becky believes our community demands high academic standards and top-notch extracurriculars that teach kids life lessons outside the classroom — and GCISD delivers.
So when you hear “back to basics,” your first question needs to be, what programs do you plan to cut?
Regardless of life stage or political party, our community unites around our proud tradition of top-ranked schools.
Families and businesses rely on our School Board (including Becky for 12 years) to find a good balance between tax rate and quality educational programs.
So when challengers begin to discuss returning to core education and needs, not wants, you have to wonder, “What do they plan to cut?” Critical safety and security updates? Extracurriculars? Teacher assistants? Career and vocational readiness classes?
The work of a Trustee is working relationships and constant advocacy. I appreciated the opportunity to talk with Texas Representative Giovanni Capriglione about the extremely important topic of cyber security, and his bill HB3743 that bolsters privacy protections for students. Rep. Capriglione was our public education ally on Texas House Bill 3 which reduced taxes, cut Robin Hood, and paid teachers more.
Education officials endorse Becky, including Tarrant County College Board President Conrad Heede and Pat Hardy, Representative for State Board of Education Region 11 and a former social studies teacher. Thank you!
Wanted to address some of the confusion about the Formula Transition Grant in House Bill 3. This is not anything new to the board or the finance team, or the state legislature for that matter.
The State wanted to avoid the “ASATR cliff” that was put into place after the 2005-2006 tax compression. In that iteration of school finance, the state put in a “hold harmless” provision so that (most) districts would not lose money in the then-new school finance system.
What happened, though, was that session after session, the state had to continually put money into ASATR, or “Additional State Aid for Tax Reduction” to keep school districts from falling off a financial cliff.
You can see in this Facebook post from 2015, it was still a concern for GCISD, even 10 years after the initial compression —
Fast forward to 2019 and HB3. To avoid another funding cliff in the HB3 “hold harmless” provision now known as the Formula Transition Grant (because that bill was not going to pass unless the vast majority of districts were indeed going to at least maintain funding if not receive substantially more, and the whole point of HB3 was to inject new money into the system for teacher raises and property tax reduction), the state put in a time limit, 2023-2024. After that year, the FTG goes away.
The state also incentivized school districts to get off the FTG as quickly as possible, by offering a golden penny but only with unanimous board approval. Depending on the formula (understand it is different amounts for every school district), that trade-off could result in a small short term funding loss, but on the long-term side, the golden penny is permanent, thus preventing a big funding shortfall at the end of the grant period in 23-24. The GCISD board opted to access the golden penny and avoid a sharp funding loss in the future.
Attended Grapevine Rotary today as a guest; one of my favorite things about this group filled with civic-minded leaders is their motto “Service Above Self.”
These are the people to thank for the flags that line Main Street for holidays and remembrances but they do so much more, including supporting our GCISD students with leadership opportunities and scholarships.
The guide has a helpful feature called “Build My Ballot” in which you can set up all of the candidates who responded, including both school board and city council races. I appreciate the opportunity to address constituents, and will be posting more voter guide links.
Re-Elect Becky St. John 
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