Houston ISD parents plan protest at middle school

HOUSTON — This week, hundreds of HISD employees learned they would lose their jobs in just a few weeks. Affected people include custodians, maintenance workers, mechanics and teachers.

Four parents of HISD students spent part of Mother’s Day preparing to hold a parent protest Monday morning in front of Meyerland Performing and Visual Arts Middle School due to mass layoffs taking place in the district.

“We don’t have anyone other than us to represent our interests and not only that, parents have to do it because teachers and principals and staff are terrified of retaliation,” Stacy Anderson said.

The moms said the principal of their children’s school shared the news he received from the district with teaching staff and the PTO last week.

“The 22-23 director was given two options: resign or risk termination,” Rochelle Cabe said.

RELATED: She was principal of the year in 2023. A year later, she said HISD forced her to resign

The group of moms said they didn’t want this to happen.

“Instead of helping support all children, they are laying off veteran teachers and principals who are creating these fantastic communities,” Kristi Pewthers said.

They want to step up and be the voice of their school community.

“Kids are growing up and learning who they are, and we need them to continue to do that,” Elizabeth Shepard said. “They were supported in this effort here. They have been allowed to find their place and their voice, and we cannot lose that to budget, scores, or any other unreliable metric.

They fear that if they don’t speak out, things will only get worse.

“It’s about all the schools in history, all those teachers and all those principals,” Anderson said.

Their hope is that together they can send a unified message to HISD.

“The district needs to understand that as mothers, we are not going to back down,” Cabe said.

Their protest is scheduled to begin at 7:30 a.m. Monday, and so far more than 200 people have already responded.

RELATED: Houston ISD superintendent defends job cuts, blames end of COVID funding, performance reviews