But career pathway program blossoms
Marfa
Marfa ISD continues to suffer from lost students after seven students left the district in recent weeks, and while their new destinations for learning are known, officials often can’t pinpoint why they left, but it is known that a new curriculum with biblical references is of concern. The enrollment loss translates into reduced state funding.
According to Elementary School Principal Rosie Martinez, the withdrawals include four from the elementary, two middle schoolers and two high schoolers. The district does know that three of those children are being homeschooled, three have relocated, and one has entered a private school. The departures occurred after two teachers were arrested for improper relationships with students, with one also facing an indecency with a minor charge. Enrollment now is 188 students.
The discussion arose at the Marfa ISD School Board meeting Monday night—with Board Members Phil Boyd, Jay Foster, Teresa Nuñez, Rene Gonzales and Stela Fuentez present.
Fuentez pressed Interim Superintendent Alferez on why the students have withdrawn and clarified her concern: “I’m asking these questions because I want us to factor this into our metrics. If we’re losing our student retention, that’s a metric, and I want us to know exactly why these students left.”
In response, Alferez said, “We’d like to know, but I don’t know if we can reach out to them and ask them.”
Fuentez asked if interviews are “part of your standard practice––like if a parent says, ‘I’m unenrolling my student,’ is there an exit conversation to capture that?”
Alferez said that the school does not currently conduct those interviews when students are disenrolled, explaining that they only know where students go because “usually that school district or that new school requests records, and that’s how we know where they enroll.”
He did note, however, that some parents have expressed concerns over the school’s recent implementation of the controversial Bluebonnet Learning curriculum, which has attracted national attention for its references to the Bible and Christianity. While the curriculum is optional for districts, the state of Texas incentivizes its adoption, offering $60 per student. This is the first semester the district is implementing the curriculum.
Bluebonnet Learning, introduced in 2024 by the Texas Education Agency, is a script-based reading and math curriculum for grades K-5. However, “[t]he American Civil Liberties Union of Texas and other organizations sent a letter to districts earlier this year urging them to avoid [Bluebonnet Learning] reading materials, saying they would ‘unlawfully impose a set of religious beliefs upon your students and violate their constitutionally guaranteed right to be free from religious coercion,’” according to a Texas Tribune article from August of this year.
MISD administrators insist that the new curriculum was a recommendation necessary to get all grade levels and students in alignment for Texas state assessments and improve school performance overall. Lessons can be substituted to reduce biblical references as individual teachers see fit, as per TEA guidance. Alferez stressed that, to his knowledge, no students have been withdrawn because of the Bluebonnet Learning curriculum, but that it did come up as a potential concern in conversations with parents.
Neighboring Alpine ISD adopted the curriculum last year and continues to implement it in their elementary school.
You can read more coverage on Bluebonnet Learning at The Texas Tribune.
The board also heard an update on BB-RISE from Regional Director Jarrett Vickers, and a number of student withdrawals in the weeks following two separate teacher second-degree felony arrests for improper relations with a student, public outcry over school leadership and a tense open forum with Interim Superintendent Arturo Alferez.
In a presentation given by Vickers, he explained that in its first couple of months of participation, MISD has seven ninth-graders, nearly half of the freshman class, enrolled in the area-wide Big Bend Rural Initiative for Success in Education (BB-RISE) program, a cross-district partnership between Marfa ISD, Alpine ISD, and Marathon ISD that offers career-aligned pathways of study that lead to credentials, work-based learning, and college credit. There are currently two pathways available—health science, offered by Alpine ISD, and business management, offered by Marathon ISD. Marfa students enrolled in these programs travel to the other districts weekly for courses.
Alferez noted that these are popular classes among freshmen, and some who are not currently participating have wondered if they can still join. Vickers encouraged those students to talk to their administrators. “You can still change your mind mid-semester freshman year or in between freshman and sophomore year,” he said.
Optimistic for continued success, he added: “Kids are talking to other kids, I think they’re going to have a little more understanding of what it is because they’ve talked to the grades ahead of them and know what to expect.”
Vickers is hoping to double Marfa students’ participation in the 2026-27 school year.