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 DL Haydon
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The Other HISD

The Other HISD
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Art by Austin Smith

Let me tell you about Hempstead, Texas.

Hempstead is a chunk of woods and farm roads with about 5,000 people. The halfway point between College Station and Houston. Hempstead was once famous for growing watermelons, selling used cars and having four out of 15 high school cheerleaders pregnant in one season.

These days it’s just the melons. Unless you count having a school district that spawned a new wave of yellow journalism as “fame.” Full disclosure, I’m from Hempstead. I lived there for 14 years. I went to elementary, middle and high school there. I’ve got friends and family that still live there. So, when I say “Let me tell you about Hempstead,” trust me. I didn’t Google it.

Hempstead ISD is little more than three brick buildings: An elementary school buried in the middle of town, a middle and high school hidden together on the edge of the city limits. They’ve got about 1,500 kids between them. The $13 million annual budget means each student is worth about $8,666, if you don’t count all the money spent on plumbing and sports jerseys. As for the faculty and staff, Hempstead ISD goes through employees like coffee filters (the current superintendent, Delma Flores-Smith took over in August 2024 after the previous one was paid off to retire). The curriculum is taught by some of the most underpaid, overworked, yet determined teachers in the world. They’d actually educate the kids, but for the illogical state-mandated focus on TAAS TAKS STAAR testing.

Enough about academic problems. Discussing the poor state of education in Texas is boring, right? Rarely is the question asked: “Is our children learning?” because we already know the answer: they is not.

There’s little reason to waste more time on the subject. Ergo, the only time the media (or anyone) pays attention to the deplorable excuse for an academic institution that is Hempstead ISD, is when something sensational occurs. As has happened on several occasions. Such was the case when a former high school principal committed suicide in 2024 during allegations of child molestation. I still recall the ABC 13 van perched outside the high school like a vulture. Or the case where a football coach was fired for purposefully leaving two students stranded in Giddings during an away game in 2024 (he got his position back three weeks later, probably because the Hempstead Bobcats made it to a meaningless state championship game).

Or the incident that could be called “agua-gate” when the HMS principal, Amy Lacey, lost her job for comments made on the loudspeaker in November 2024. You no doubt read the headlines:

  • Houston Chronicle: “Spanish Speaking Ban” and “Hempstead middle school principal fired over Spanish issue will appeal”
  • NBC Channel 2: “School denies attempt to block kids from speaking Spanish” and “Principal accused of Banning Spanish”
  • Fox 26 “Spanish Ban Backlash,” “Principal who Hispanic students say told them not to speak Spanish in class one step closer to being terminated” and “Hempstead principal who told Hispanic students to only speak English in class gets the boot”
  • Huffington Post: “Principal Put On Leave After Trying To Forbid Spanish In Classroom”
  • Crooksandliars.com “Principal Bans Spanish In Majority-Hispanic School To ‘Prevent Disruptions’.”

The news outlets never asked why a principal would ban Spanish. I guess we’re all expected to know principals are notoriously xenophobic. Here’s the thing: Lacey never said that students were banned from speaking Spanish.

This came after two students started a fight in a classroom (business as usual), using some very heated Spanish vocabulary, in the presence of a non-Spanish-speaking teacher. There’s a case to be made about having bilingual teachers, but the point is that these disruptions were becoming the norm.

Is that not good enough for you? Not sexy enough to make national headlines? My sources, which range from middle school students to faculty and staff, all of whom will remain anonymous for obvious reasons, filled me in.

What Lacey did in that loudspeaker speech was commit academic and political suicide by pointing out that the Hispanic students should take advantage and speak English during their English, reading, math, science and social studies classes. She highlighted that the students would have to take the STAAR test in English later on in the school year. Lacey stressed the importance of the student’s native language, she pointed out the importance of their Hispanic heritage. The district even sent home letters with students to clarify that no one was banning Spanish, just in case there was still any confusion about anyone banning Spanish.

But cultural diversity doesn’t sell a newspaper, get television ratings or cause someone to click a link on Twitter. Race baiting does.

Maybe some of the kids misheard. Maybe some of them had a chip on their shoulders. People went crazy over the indignation that a middle school principal would dare “prohibit free speech.” News crews smelled blood in the water, showed up in town and began randomly interviewing Spanish-speaking students (who weren’t even in the room during the fight, not that the news cared about what caused the incident at this point). The social justice warriors united on Facebook and Twitter to champion the cause (even though they couldn’t find Hempstead on a map). The Mexican Legal and Education Fund as well as the League of United Latin American Citizens appeared at Hempstead school board meetings to keep the defenseless children from dropping out under all the oppression. Lacey was put on leave (later her contract wasn’t renewed). Everyone decided that the English privilege in Hempstead had to be put in check. That was the priority. Not the lack of proper tools for teachers, not the disciplinary issues, not the corruption.

About a month before this all happened, a story came out in the Houston Chronicle titled “Probe sought of Waller County school district finances.” Not to butcher the article, here is a spark notes version:

“Waller County constable requested the Texas Rangers and FBI launch an investigation into alleged embezzlement . . . he discovered through an open records request . . . approached by concerned citizens who complained that thousands of tax dollars were being misappropriated . . . people who were in place were just rubber stamping . . . Chappell Hill plumbing company owned by the business manager’s husband . . . in the past seven years has received at least $153,000 in work from the school district . . . dysfunctional, no checks and balances . . . $3.50 in materials linked to hundreds of dollars in labor . . . Hempstead community was unaware of these contract negotiations . . . tax dollars spent is information available to the public”

Did this misappropriation of money make national or even state headlines? Did it cause the American Civil Liberties Union to jump in? Did thousands on Facebook decide to throw their two cents down? No. No one cared. It wasn’t hot enough. But the accusation that a middle school principal “banned” Spanish on campus? That was sexy. News used to use a hierarchy of “if it bleeds it leads.” These days, the creed goes something like “if it offends a social justice warrior it leads.” This can also be read, “If it appears to bleed, it leads.”

Whatever blame the media deserves, whether from continually following the story without fact checking, or by taking photos of the town to make it look like a ranch, they stoked the fires. In February, several Hempstead ISD buses were tampered with, some say in retaliation for firing Lacy, some say in retaliation for “banning” Spanish. By “tampered with” I mean the brake lines were cut and a dead cat was smeared all over one of the engines. The Hempstead ISD police chief was later fired for allegedly failing to investigate whoever did it. This is one of several people in the school district who have lost their jobs, and the reasoning behind why varies.

If you need more proof that the issue isn’t “Hempstead ISD hates Spanish,” but whether or not the school is run by professionals, or even academically acceptable, just take a trip on the internet.

On April 2, a Hempstead bus driver (who shall remain nameless) posted on Facebook shortly after being fired “MY BUS DRIVING DAYS ARE OVER…..Free at last, free at last, thank God almighty I am free at last…..at least from the unprofessional, bureaucratic tentacles of Hempstead ISD.” He also posted that he would have driven for another 20 years but for the conduct of the school. That police chief who was fired? A similar post about how the school is “under attack.”

Of course framing some sensationalist picture of an oppressive, mean-spirited Anglo principal who slaps duct tape on the mouths of brown students will get news organizations higher ratings. But that’s not what happened, and now everyone is fixated on an enemy that doesn’t exist. Meanwhile, Hempstead ISD is so scared that they’re worried more about PR than the students. They can’t go one board meeting or Facebook post without injecting keywords like “culture of excellence” and “diversity” for fear of being labelled racist, despite the fact that Hempstead ISD has been ethnically diverse for decades. Meanwhile, the students continue to get STAAR crammed down their throats, they receive sub-par food in the cafeteria and they become more and more likely to graduate (or not) without a clue as to how the real world works.

But no worries. Give it a few more months, or a few more semesters. The world will forget Hempstead exists. The social justice warriors will find another cause. The civil liberties groups will drop the kids like hot rocks. Hempstead ISD will continue to be a corrupt, academically unacceptable sports gulag where every student, regardless of their native language or melanin content, will get put to the wayside. Or worse, they’ll get forced to take the STAAR test.

7 Responses to The Other HISD

  1. Deven Badeaux May 9, 2024 at 6:39 pm

    Hempstead Graduate here. I remember alot of the incidents mentioned here. I didn’t have the pleasure to hear about the latest, however. The only advice I can offer those poor HS students is to do the same thing I did when I graduated. Get the F out. Run for the hills. If you stay in that town you’ll get sucked into a world of failure. There are no desirable jobs, no college (minus Blinn and PV..lol) and no opportunity. So if you’re a Hempstead Highschool student reading this, please, find a way out of that damn town. Don’t become a welfare statistic and go make something of yourself else where.

    Also, if Anthony Borski and Catherine Herbert are still teaching, tell them Deven Badeaux says thank you.

  2. Demarcus Cobb May 9, 2024 at 9:27 am

    Always a pleasure reading these posts. Keep doing what you do! There needs to be more people like you (especially in good ol Texas) trying to raise awareness on stuff that actually matters!

  3. The Truth is This... May 9, 2024 at 8:57 am

    You really must have been limited to whom you got your information from because your perspective is somewhat tainted based upon what’s obvious. You must not have interviewed any one from the African-American community who was aware that same Mrs. Lacy used the same intercom and announced that black kids shouldn’t be calling each other “nigger” in the hallways. She also instructed a 7th grade football player to stop acting like a “vagina” (I’ll use the clean version) when he started crying after being knocked senseless by someone twice his size at football practice. She told this story to a room full of new and returning teachers at an in-service meeting prior to school starting. Mrs. Lacy also came to school intoxicated. Many times. Have you talked to any of the current teachers about this?

    What’s sad is that the people who know the truth about what’s really happening in Hempstead ISD are afraid to step up and tell it for the fear of being singled out in the community or losing their jobs. Lacy may have not been racist, but she said racist things that administrators shouldn’t. We attend sensitivity workshops/trainings to teach us how to talk to culturally diverse students. Yes, I am in the education realm.

    The “race card’ was not played in this incident. Lacy established a pattern of questionable statements and it was investigated. It’s evident that your research, in all it’s glory, is flawed seeing how you didn’t include a total pool of clients.

    You sir, being from Hempstead, knows how the culture is/was in that community. Now, that the demographics are changing, the status quo is a little less accepting of what’s obvious. Hempstead is not lily-white anymore and change is coming. You can bet on it….

  4. Banana May 8, 2024 at 2:40 pm

    Someone finally said something! I have a friend in Hempstead High who complained about staying in a “room without windows” while suffering through a six hour STAAR English Test.

  5. Jackie Romine May 8, 2024 at 2:32 pm

    Wow. It’s amazing. An ex-student of HHS that writes really, really well. I do think that everyone misses one little fact. The TEA guidelines require that the core subjects be conducted in English. That means teachers and students speak English. Thanks for a fair hearing.

  6. Ralph May 8, 2024 at 2:18 pm

    If you think that Waller ISD story sounds bad, Google “Beaumont ISD”

  7. Mari May 8, 2024 at 1:44 pm

    I have to thank you for being bold and brave enough to publish this. I am in Hempstead and have been in this fight. While there are a few things I wish you had known, like how things had improved the last few years, I will be forever thankful for the fact that you did not throw us under the bus as everyone else has. Thank you for checking facts and asking questions. Thank you for telling the truth about STARR too!

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