The Dallas Independent School District (Dallas ISD or DISD) is a school district based in Dallas, Texas, United States. It operates schools in much of Dallas County and is the second-largest school district in Texas and the seventeenth-largest in the United States. During the 1990s, the district branded itself as Dallas Public Schools (DPS).Earlier versions of the website for DISD used this name: // For the acronym see

As of 2017, the school district was rated "as having met the standard" by the Texas Education Agency.

History

1800s The Dallas public school district in its current form was first established in Dallas in 1884, although there is evidence that public schools had existed for Dallas prior to that date.Walter J. E. Schiebel, Ed.D. (1966) Education in Dallas: Ninety-two years of history 1874–1966. Dallas: Dallas Independent School District. Mayor W. L. Cabell ordered just one month after the June 16, 1884, district founding that "all former Ordinances in relation to the city public school are hereby repealed," and the district's 1884–85 superintendent, a Mr. Boles, had enrollment figures for each year from 1880 through his own tenure;Scheibel, page 1; a table indicates that 1880 had 1,218 students enrolled; 1881, 1,351 students; 1882, 1,453 students; 1883, 1,760 students; 1884, 2,537 students; and 1885, 3,204 students.

The Dallas Directory of 1873 expressed regret that "there are no public schools in Dallas," while the 1875 Directory said that "the schools are near perfection."Scheibel, page 1.

The 1884 organizational meeting coincides with changes in statewide education law establishing a system of school districts, each to be assigned its own number, with the ability to levy taxes and raise funds as well as to determine the length of school terms and other educational decisions. The state superintendent of schools, Benjamin M. Baker, praised the new law's abandonment of tying teachers' salaries to the number of pupils attending, a practice he called "a relic of barbarism."Schiebel, page 3.

By 1884, six schools were operating. Four were designated for "whites" and two for "colored/black",Schiebel, page 10. as school segregation was the legal policy in Texas at the time. Booker T. Washington High School is one of these original schools, beginning as "Colored School No. 2" in 1884 and adopting its later name in 1902.Schiebel, pages 11–12.

School District Expansion

Dallas ISD has annexed many schools and school districts throughout its history: 1920: Lagow Independent School,Schiebel, pages 253–256. a one-room school attended only by the Lagow children and one other family; a quitclaim deed signed by the Lagow heirs and the property soldSchiebel, page 56. 1922: Maple Lawn ISD 1926: Irwindell ISD 1927: Greenland Hills Territory; Gould School District, a one-teacher school; West Dallas ISD 1928: Lisbon School District; Bluff View Estates; Love Field; Cockrell Hill School District; Eagle Ford Common School District; Beeman Common School District; Fair Grounds Common School District; Arcadia Park Shale; Bonnie View Common School District; Cement City ISD 1929: Floyd Common School District #60 1937: Vickery Common School District 1945: Bayles Common School District #59; Reinhardt Common School District; Pleasant Mound ISD; Vickery ISD 1946: Walnut Hill Common School District #79; Letot Common School District #7 1948: Vickery Independent School District (adding Vickery Meadows) 1949: Parts of the Lake Highlands area, from Richardson ISD 1952: Scyene Common School District; Union Bower School District #50 1954: Farmers Branch ISD; Addison ISD; Wheatland Common School District; and territory from Mesquite ISD 1954: Pleasant Grove Independent School District was annexed in 1954 (adding Pleasant Grove) 1954: Pleasant Grove High School was replaced by Samuell High School 1959: Territory from Lancaster ISD; Rylie ISD; territory from Grand Prairie ISD 1960: Buckner ISD 1963: Parts of Garland ISD 1965: Seagoville ISD of Seagoville

The school system expanded from offering 11 grades to a modern 12-year program as of 1941. Initially, the change was resisted by families who felt the additional year would be too expensive, though others promoted the addition of a further year of athletics and some anticipated an ability for gifted students to finish the 12-year program in as little as 10.5 years, although that hope did not prove a reality.Schiebel, page 130.

The period from 1946 to 1966 saw construction of schools, with 97 of the district's school buildings erected during this period, at a peak of 17 schools in 1956 alone.Schiebel, pages 132-133.

Desegregation

School desegregation in Texas did not begin for nearly six years after the United States Supreme Court made its May 17, 1954, Brown v. Board of Education decision, nullifying the previous doctrine of "separate but equal" public facilities. The Dallas school board commissioned studies over the next several months, deciding in August 1956, that desegregation was premature and that the segregated system would stay in place for 1956–57.Schiebel, page 160.

In 1957, Texas passed legislation requiring that districts not integrate their schools unless district residents voted to approve the change. An August 1960, election for this purpose ended with voters rejecting desegregation. Meanwhile, a lawsuit was filed by the district against the state superintendent on August 13, 1958, with the goal of a resolution of conflicts between federal and state courts on the subject of integration.

In 1960, the district initially adopted a plan to desegregate grade by grade, starting with the 1961 first-grade class, and proceed year by year until desegregation had been achieved. The plan was amended only weeks later to provide for movement of students at parent request.

On September 1, 1965, the elementary schools were ordered to be desegregated, initially to be followed by the junior high schools in 1966 and the senior high schools in 1967; however, the Fifth Circuit United States Court issued an order on September 7 that led to amending the ruling so that all twelve grades must be desegregated as of September 1, 1965. A book on the history of DISD published the following year by the school district made the statement, "Desegregation of the Dallas Schools was accomplished in the course of ten short years with a minimum of commotion and stress ... [due to] the patient and sympathetic understanding ... and the flinty determination of the School Board ... to serve the public in their lawfully constituted duty."Schiebel, page 159. In September 1967 Dallas ISD states that its schools were desegregated.http://library.law.smu.edu/disd/background.shtm However, lawsuits against the district from parents of Black children continued for decades.

During one desegregation lawsuit in the 1970s, a judge suggested that students from different schools could interact via television instead of forcing desegregation busing in the district. The parties filing suit did not like the plan.Parks, Scott. "Integration plan went down tubes ." The Dallas Morning News. November 17, 2002. Retrieved on September 8, 2009. After the forced busing desegregation, in the 1970s many white students and families withdrew from district schools en masse.

While DISD believed it had complied with the Brown ruling from 1954, Sam Tasby of Love Field disagreed. He had to send his two children several miles to an all-Black school, despite there being an all-White school within walking distance of his house. On October 6, 1970, Tasby filed a lawsuit against DISD claiming that the school district continued to operate a segregated system.

Tasby's challenge wound its way through the courts over the next 33 years, eventually getting passed to Judge Barefoot Sanders. After a series of hearings, Judge Sanders found that DISD continued to show signs of segregation and constituted the Desegregation Plan for the Dallas Independent School District.

In August 1983, the DISD school board finally ended its fight against court-ordered desegregation by unanimously accepting the Fifth Circuit's upholding of Judge Sanders's desegregation plan. From that time on, DISD would remain under Sanders's oversight until he declared it desegregated.

In June 2003, 49 years after Brown v. Board was decided, Judge Sanders ruled that Dallas ISD was desegregated and no longer subject to his oversight.SMU Library SMU Underwood Law Library

1990s and 2000s

In 1996, DISD announced that it would en masse rezone many areas to different schools. DISD officials said that the rezoning, which would affect over 40 campuses, would be the largest such rezoning since at least the 1950s.Bleiberg, Larry. "School-boundary proposals faulted; DISD seeking the most changes in attendance zones since '50s." The Dallas Morning News. Monday February 5, 1996. 13A. Retrieved on September 6, 2011.

In the summer of 2005, the Texas Education Agency (TEA) ordered the Wilmer-Hutchins Independent School District closed for the 2005–2006 school year due to financial stress and reported mismanagement. After negotiations, Dallas ISD agreed to accept the students for the 2005–2006 school year. The Wilmer-Hutchins ISD district was absorbed into Dallas ISD in summer 2006.

Dallas ISD opened 11 new campuses in the fall of 2006. The district incorporated the WHISD territory via "Plan K," adopted on November 30, 2006.

From 2005 to 2007, several northwest Dallas area public schools under Dallas ISD jurisdiction became infamous due to the outbreak of a Dallas-area recreational drug, a version of heroin mixed with Tylenol PM, called "cheese," which led to several deaths of Dallas-area youths. Dallas ISD issued drug dog searches to schools in order to combat the problem.

Dallas ISD was reported in April 2008 to have the 7th highest dropout rate of any urban school district in the US.Stutz, Terrence and Tawnell D. Hobbs, Grad rate formula to be uniform:Spellings issues order; dropout rate report puts DISD 7th worst, Dallas Morning News, April 2, 2008. Retrieved January 24, 2009

Circa 2012 the district was shutting down some schools in central Dallas which had enrollment declines, while it was building new schools in outlying areas of the district, which had population increases. That year five schools were opening, with most of them in Southeast Dallas and Seagoville. The district planned to close eleven schools in the same year; the income levels in the neighborhoods hosting the closing schools tended to be very low and student populations had consistently declined. Of the nine board members, the vote was six to two in favor of closing with one abstention.

By 2016 the district was expanding the use of two-way bilingual programs, with 24 schools of 51 two-way bilingual programs beginning that year. - Spanish version: "¿Cuáles escuelas en Dallas ISD ofrecen educación bilingüe ‘two-way’?"

Effective July 1, 2018, four elementary schools originally named for confederate generals were renamed: William L. Cabell Elementary in Farmers Branch became Chapel Hill Preparatory School Stonewall Jackson Elementary in Lower Greenville, Dallas became Mockingbird Elementary Albert Sidney Johnston Elementary became Cedar Crest Elementary Robert E. Lee Elementary in Lower Greenville became Geneva Heights Elementary

COVID-19 Pandemic

During the COVID-19 pandemic in Texas, in 2021 the DISD board voted to require masks, contradicting Governor of Texas Greg Abbott's order to disallow school districts in the state from having mask mandates. Despite the Texas Supreme Court stating that Abbott had the authority to remove mask mandates, Dallas ISD kept its mask mandate in place.

Data Breach

On August 8, 2021, Dallas ISD suffered a data breach affecting the information of students and employees from 2010 to 2021.