Ector County ISD welcomed roughly 33,500 students back to school Monday with cheerleaders, football players, band members and a visit from Superintendent Scott Muri.
Muri visited a number of campuses, but media joined him at Gale Pond Alamo Elementary. ECISD does a phased-in opening with prekindergarten through fifth, sixth graders and ninth graders. The remaining grades return Aug. 13.
Principal Elisha Sessions said they had 344 students in pre-k through fifth grade. The school is also transitioning to the New Tech Network and will be using project-based learning.
The campus was STEM focused before, but will be blending that in with the New Tech approach.
Monday, students were getting accustomed to their environment and teachers.
“We’ve seen today the Permian and Odessa High School cheerleaders and band and football players greeting and welcoming students, especially at the elementary level. They get to know their teachers, their administrators. They learn routines, kind of how school works, or how their classroom environment works. So a lot of that early learning takes place today, so that on day two, they can jump right into some academic subjects. So a whole lot of relationship building on day one,” Muri said.
“We opened today the elementary version of our New Tech Network school” at Gale Pond Alamo, he said.
Alamo has been a STEM magnet school focusing on science, technology, engineering and math.
“It will be a direct feeder pattern to the new New Tech Middle School, and then ultimately, New Tech High School. Project-based learning is their theme. It is learning through doing projects. They’ll combine their English, math, science and social studies courses into learning opportunities, and they’ll use projects as they learn about social studies and the arts and sciences etc.; a really powerful way for kids to learn. We’re excited to bring it to the elementary. We’ll be one of the very few kindergarten through 12th grade feeder patterns for New Tech in the state of Texas,” Muri said.
He added that Alamo will continue its heavy STEM focus, but the students will be learning through projects.
“Teachers will take the different learning domains, if you will, mathematics, science, English, social studies and the arts, and then combine those into different projects. The kids will spend several weeks working on projects that will help them learn those very specific domains. Rather than learning subjects in isolation, this helps students realize that the world in which we live is actually interconnected, and we’ll get to do that starting here at this school,” Muri said.
He added that there are quite a few high schools across the country that are part of the New Tech Network, including George H.W. Bush New Tech Odessa. There are very few elementary and middle schools that are part of the network.
Once the new career and technical education center opens, the career and technical education courses that are currently in the New Tech building will be moved and that will free up classrooms for the NTO middle school, Chief Communications Officer Mike Adkins said.
Muri added that Alamo is a choice school.
“Our families choose to come here, and we’ll see a bit of that taking place. We’re excited about that. Our parents are excited about it. When we did some surveying a couple of years ago on choices and options in Ector County, this is one of those opportunities that parents wanted us to expand, and so we’re excited to be able to (bring that) down to the elementary level,” he said.
Muri said he never gets over the excitement of the first day of school. To him, every one of them is special.
“Then to watch kids come in and meet their teacher for the very first time; see the shiny floors and all the bows that the little girls wear on that first day, and just all of the energy. You can’t get enough of this. (I) love the first day of school and all that it entails.
“This one will certainly have a lot of significance for me, but my joy is watching the faces of these kids as they walk in for the first time for the school year … I think I’m always, no matter where I am or what I do, (I’ll) have to figure out a way to be a part of the first day of school and experience that energy,” Muri added.
Muri said Monday was about celebrating the journey that the students are taking.
“It’s (the) next step. As an adult, I remember my own first days and I can connect those experiences with what’s happening in life today. I know that these kids, whether it’s here at Alamo, at the New Tech Network, or wherever they happen to be in ECISD, their experiences today will forever impact them tomorrow,” he added.
In a third-grade classroom, Muri asked one of the girls for her favorite part of school and she said it was the teacher. He asked if it was last year’s teacher and she said it was this year’s teacher.
“Well, she’s known her for two hours, but already that is her favorite thing about school, is this human being that is leading her classroom. I hope that all of our kids today will be able to talk about their experiences today in school, being very positive and healthy, and they’re excited to come back tomorrow,” Muri said.
He added that they have reduced some teaching positions, but not people due to budget cuts.
“We didn’t lose any human bodies, but we cut the number of teachers that we needed to hire and that we would employ this year. (We) made some efficiency decisions on several campuses, and so we’ll certainly feel … the impact. In fact, some of our kids may notice a little bit less elbow room this year because of our state budget cuts. One of our opportunities this year will be to remind our state legislature and our elected officials about the importance of investing in public education. There is no greater investment that we can make than in the future of our nation, and that future is in our classrooms today. So we will continue to work with our state officials to ensure that we have the dollars that we need to do the important work that must be done in classrooms, not only throughout Ector County, but throughout the state of Texas,” Muri said.
Sessions said Alamo had a “phenomenal start” to their first day.
“First days are very exciting for both teachers and administrators. The halls have been empty all summer, and so to fill them back up with kids is exciting and endearing, because this is the work that we do every single day. Without kids here, it makes it not as fun,” Sessions said.
“As we move into project-based learning, it’s just the campus growing. That’s kind of the goal of implementing PBL through New Tech Network is just the growth of the campus and ultimately feeding into a middle school that will feed into NTO. We’ve been in training throughout the summer learning the NTN curriculum and we’ll begin implementing that in pre-K through second in the weeks ahead. It’s some groundwork up front. We have to get them familiar with some vocabulary and the collaborative part of working together. But once we feel like we’ve got that solid, then we’ll start,” Sessions said.
The campus will implement project-based learning in grades prekindgarten through second this year. Starting in the spring, the teachers in grade three through five will begin the foundational work and they will attend training in Oakland, Calif., in the summer.
“We’ll be fully implemented for the ‘25-‘26 school year,” Sessions said.
