HENRY DIBRELL

  Mr. Dibrell's financial supporters for the 2014 election are:  Alonzo and Mayble Hunter  $100.00, Romer and Mauri Austria  $100.00, David and Marilyn Frishman  $100.00, John Niyon  In-Kind Contribution with no dollar amount listed for website design, Steve and Molly Reichardt  $100.00, John and Laurie Crosby  $75.00, Don Elder, Jr.  $100.00, David and Susan Patrick  $100.00, Rudy Rodolfo Mancinas  $500.00, Christina Crockett  $100.00 which adds up to $1,275.00 plus whatever a web design is worth.  Total political contributions listed on his TEC forms:  $1,950.  Total political contributions $50 or less  --$1,700.  Total contributions $3,650.

  It's sort of interesting to think that thirty-four people gave Mr. Dibrell $50 or less.  That's a lot of people who don't want anyone to know they contributed to his campaign!

Henry Dibrell turned  on his supporters the minute he was elected three years ago in 2011.  He took a $500.00 campaign contribution from Linebarger who was wanting KISD's tax collection business, and Dibrell took it right AFTER he was elected, which makes his accepting the money look suspicious.  People usually don't give campaign contributions right AFTER someone gets elected unless they want something. What they wanted was Mr. Dibrell's favorable vote, and when the time came he gave it to them.

Interestingly, State Representative Bill Callegari contributed $250.00 AFTER the election to Mr. Dibrell,  but he did offer an endorsement before the election:

 Dibrell does not own a house in the Katy school district (he rents one), and, in my opinion, he would seem to be unqualified to vote on taxes for the rest of us who do own property.  He has also voted every chance he could get WITH the people he railed against while running for the office, and he was duplicitous to some of us who gave him campaign donations (and bacon and tomato sandwiches at their breakfast room table!). He sold us out so he could be the Sergeant-At-Arms on the Board.  It's hard to imagine what he was thinking and how foolish that made him look. He also managed to worm his way onto the Board of the Katy Tea Party and was greatly responsible for keeping the Tea Party from endorsing Cynthia Blackman, a former KISD teacher, and Terri Majors, a former KISD principal, who were running for the school board in 2012, and who would have been responsible school board members.

 Itseems to me that what we have here, pretty much, is a turncoat interloping opportunist! He has no business background to speak of; he apparently can't or won't buy a house in our school district; he has nothing spectacular in the way of a formal education; and yet here he is telling all of us how to academically educate OUR children while we all pay for HIS brood to all attend KISD schools with OUR KISD tax dollars! In my opinion he is a sycophant. It's preposterous.

  Dibrell lives in a house at 918 Long Prairie and works for Amobi Okoye, a South African, who created a foundation when he was drafted by the Houston Texans. Mr. Dibrell administers the foundation.*

The only good thing Dibrell did in my humble opinion, and for which I am grateful, is that he is responsible for keeping the IB (International Baccalaureate) program that the superintendent was determined to install in KISD, out of the District. But that alone doesn't make up for all the other misguided votes and actions that he has taken or his disregard for those who elected him!

This month (August 2013), Katy ISD School Board member Henry Dibrell wrote the ""cover story" for Absolutely Katy.  http://absolutelykaty.com/2013/07/katy-independent-school-district-america%e2%80%99s-destination-school-district/ This periodical has seemingly been on its last legs of late, so I guess they are willing to try anything to garner readers.

As all these local magazines know, puffing up the reputation of our school district is what the readers want to hear.  Their readers, they know, have spent tons on a great new house, and the last thing they want to hear is that their children are receiving but a mediocre education in the Katy Independent School District.

Yes, I will agree, that people do move to this area because of the school district.  But their estimation of its stature is the product of a lot of hype by the school district.  The more people, the more taxes, the more they can hire educators, administrators, architects, et cetera, and the happier they all are--and never mind that the academic education that they are providing is inferior.

Here's an article I wrote last fall about Mr. Dibrell's article in Absolutely Katy:

I was struck by Mr. Dibrell's cavalier use of what he calls "facts."  

1.  I'm not sure how many of his neighbors he talked to in order to "learn that the reason 80% of them moved to Katy" is because of the school district.  Did he talk to ten of them, twenty of them,  a hundred of them, or is he just guessing?  A lot of people move here because the housing is cheap for what one gets and close to jobs in the oil industry complexes or medical facilities along Interstate 10.  (I moved here to get my children out of Houston ISD. I was running from, not to, and we could buy a great big house with a huge back yard for $140,000.)

2.  His statement that "almost 3,000 new students move into the Katy ISD boundaries every year" is a flat out lie.  Since 2006 the number has been closer to 2,000 or below except for one year (2008 when there were 3,037 new students).  The Katy ISD school board and their superintendent throw this number out on a regular basis.  That's because they are members of the Fast Growth Schools Coalition which is a group of superintendents who have banded together to form a lobbying organization to squeeze more tax dollars out of the State Legislature under false pretenses, in my opinion.

3.  To suggest that "KISD students outperform their state counterparts in every category as proven by scores in state measured tests." is another obfuscation of the truth.  Think about what the cohort is for their "state counterparts."  Dibrell is telling his readers that KISD students are doing better on a dumbed down test than ALL the students in Texas.  Think about who those students include, and one can see that such is not a very great accomplishment--but it sounds good!

4.  Mr. Dibrell points out that "eight KISD students received National Merit Scholarships."   One has to wonder if he knows why the other 34 National Merit Semi-finalists didn't get one.  And if you want to brag about these 41 students who achieved this award of academic excellence, read their names here and know that their PARENTS, not the Katy schools, taught them most of what they know in order to be able to do well on the PSAT.  Doing so is part of their culture. It is their PARENTS who deserve the pat on the back and the accolades, NOT KISD. If Katy ISD had anything at all to do with the number of students becoming National Merit Semi-finalists, someone tell me what there aren't ANY at Morton Ranch and Mayde Creek high schools! 

Cinco Ranch High School: Austin Anthis, David Bjerkaas, Bohao Cheng, Ji-Hoon Cho, Daniel Fernee, Celine Lee, Yifei Li, Hongzhou Liu, Dmitri Mirakyan, Shinq Yng Tan, Tiffaney Tran and Katherine Yu.

Katy High School: Maxwell Healy.

Seven Lakes High School: Shreya Bagali, Aubrey Baker, Angela Camille, Larry Ding, Alissa Hall, Mei-Hui Kao, Lisa Liu, Gerar Nawab, Akash Punnoose, Chanelle Qi, Dylan Rasch, Tejaswi Veerati, Huan Wu, Zhuoqun Xie, Pearl Xin, Michelle Xu, and Shirley Xu.

Taylor High School: Naveen Balakrishnan, Woo Choi, Carly Hatchell, Sohye Joo, Sung Kim, Margaret Lin, Ye Lin, Brianna Long, Sarah Stevenson, Hannah Viola, and Grant Winkelmann.

Notice too, that scholarship is not as prevalent in three of our high schools as it is in the other three.  All of our high schools have the same curriculum.  They have the same kinds of teachers making the same amounts of salary. These schools got designed by the same overpriced architectural firm (PBK).  So what is the difference?  If the schools will not take credit for the LACK of scholarship at the high schools on the north side of the freeway, they don't get to take credit FOR these high scores on the PSAT at the schools on the south side of the freeway either!

5.  In touting the KISD fine arts' programs, Dibrell cites the "degreed teachers and the participation in the Texas State Band."  He doesn't quite have the facts correct here either.  There isn't a "Texas State Band" as he suggests, but there are SEVEN  All-State Bands that are composed of students who have endured auditions and been chosen by members of  the Texas Music Educators Association. It's hard to tell what he is suggesting here. It's especially troubling that he doesn't know what he's saying here when he has children in the band program!

6.  Then he quotes from the KISD Mission Statement--a paragraph containing words and ideas against which I have argued for twenty years.  Mostly I'm concerned with a definition of terms.

Tell me please what these words and phrases mean:

"educational excellence"

"learning experiences"

And  how do such "experiences prepare and inspire each student to live an honorable fulfilling life to create the future"?  Somebody please tell me how it is possible for a student to "create the future."

8. I'm really getting tired of the assertion that the Katy schools "reflect the community's values."  Pray tell WHEN did they ever ask us what our values are?  How do they know without asking?  I would like to tell you that MY values are certainly not the same as Henry Dibrell's or Alton Frailey's!!!!

9.  And finally, if someone is an elected member of the local school board, wouldn't one think he would proof read his article for spelling and composition errors?  Mr. Dibrell would never have passed MY English class.

Mr. Dibrell would have us believe that he is somehow qualified to be telling all of us how to educate our children. 

Mr. Dibrell has a marketing degree from Northwestern State University in Louisiana. He has worked for Dillards, Van Heusen, Turning Point,  a church and a non-profit foundation. [And that University he attended in Louisiana is often written by Dibrell WITHOUT the STATE being in there trying to make it look like, in my opinion, that he went to THE Northwestern University!]

And yes, I supported Dibrell when he ran in 2011--but he lied to me about what he stood for, and I will not support him again. 

*Mr. Dibrell is no longer the foundation director.