PECOS Pecos-Barstow-Toyah ISD is a bustling place right now. They have six different construction projects going on financed by a $178,560,000 bond passed last May.
Two elementary schools, a maintenance, child nutrition and technology facility and a new career and technical education center for the high school are also in the works.
The maintenance, child nutrition, support, alternative education and technology facility will be named after Johnny V. Mata, a fallen soldier in the Iraq war. Chief Academic Officer Karen Matt said the building will be open in August.
The new elementary schools will replace Bessie Haynes and Austin elementary schools.
With the two new campuses, they will consolidate to four. Currently, there is a pre-kindergarten and kindergarten campus and an elementary campus that houses first through third and another campus that has fourth and fifth grade, Communications Officer Nydia Natividad said.
Superintendent Brent Jaco said the CTE facility will enclose 60,000 to 70,000 square feet and have state-of-the-art career and technology spaces for students.
A stadium and staff housing is being built with fund balance, district reserve funds.
Jaco started at Pecos-Barstow-Toyah in July 2020. A couple of months later, they started on a long-range plan and hired an architecture team in October 2020 to take a deep dive into the condition of the district’s facilities.
A stakeholder steering committee was formed in December 2020.
“Those meetings continued into January of ‘21,” Jaco said.
In February 2021, the committee presented a bond package to the board and the board approved it. The bond passed in May 2021.
The total tax rate is now $1.0605 per $100 valuation. It was $1.0505. The steering committee recommended going up 1 cent, Jaco said.
When he arrived in Pecos, Jaco said the district had needs in several areas.
“… One of those areas was facilities. The average age of our facilities was about 65 years old. Our current high school is about 72 years old … We know that students learn differently than they did 40, 50, 60-plus years ago and we needed to build new facilities … not only to support student learning, but also the older facilities will (become) a burden to the taxpayers in the sense it becomes much harder for upkeep,” Jaco said.
He added that it also becomes more costly in the long run.
The district also reconfigured grades so there will be a prek-4 to first grade and a second through fifth grade school.
The reason, he said, is because the less students have to transition through school, the better they typically do.
“We wanted to limit the transition, but we also wanted to be strategic about transitions and so we look at the grades prek-4 although we do some work with prek-3. But prek-4 through first grade, that age range is you’re learning how to read so it’s good to group those kids together …,” Jaco said.
“Second through fifth grade is still an elementary age, but they’re really starting to take reading and apply it differently so they’re reading to learn a little bit more, as opposed to learning how to read,” he added.
The junior high won’t change. It will still have grades six to eight and the high school will still have grades 9-12.
When you are able to raise your tax rate by just a penny, Jaco said it makes good economic sense for the taxpayers.
“… When you think about that bond and our tax base here in Pecos … a little more than 95 percent of our tax base comes from oil and gas and minerals, so really the majority of the bond is being paid for by oil and gas and not by rooftops,” he said.
The district has 2,675 students and about 250 teachers and it is expected to grow based on demographic predictions.
“It’s been at least 40 years since they’ve built a school. We’re excited about it. We have a lot of work going on behind the scenes. We have six different construction projects going on right now; two of those are brand new elementary schools. … Those schools are slated to be ready by August of 2023, so we’re excited for that time period to come and ‘23-‘24 school year to start so we can open up those new facilities and let the kids experience what modern school learning is about,” Jaco said.
The contractor is BTC Construction in El Paso and the architects are VLK Architects.
Matt said all the buildings have portables. With the new construction, she said they won’t need them.
She added that the grade reconfiguration is a game changer. When the district’s buildings were constructed, learning was different. Students sat at their desks, in their rows and the teacher taught.
“We know that our students now use technology to learn. Our old facilities weren’t built for Wi-Fi and they weren’t built to charge devices. They weren’t built for small-group instruction and the intervention classrooms, so that has totally changed. They have these new collaborative spaces and some flexible places … bigger libraries that can hold the amount of books that we know our kids need to be able to have access to, so total game-changer for students,” Matt said.
“It’s a game-changer for teachers and it really just changes the way that they get to go about their job and help students,” Matt added.
Matt noted that the buildings will be constructed without learning being interrupted.
Another step officials are taking to improve the district is one-time hiring stipends for teachers. Assistant Superintendent of Organizational Management Cara Malone said the district has less than 20 openings.
There are incentives based on timing, teaching special education, English as a second language, bilingual and math and certified teachers who graduated from Pecos High School. There is also a relocation stipend.
Special education teachers can be eligible for an extra $2,000 stipend right now, Malone said.
“So we have a $2,000 stipend if you signed on by May 1; a $1,000 by June 1 and they do have to be certified teachers. That’s really the main stipulation. They have to have all those credentials completed before they start the year,” Malone said.
Malone has worked in several districts. Most recently she came from Alamogordo, N.M., but she was in Dallas-Fort Worth before that.
Malone said she has been making the rounds of job fairs.
“We’ve talked to a lot of really exciting, talented young people that are looking for that perfect place. We’re hoping they find that to be Pecos because we do have a lot to offer and we do have other stipends, too. We have a relocation stipend, which is for teachers, counselors and administrators. We’ll pay $1,500 for you to relocate if you’re an individual and $2,500 if you’re a couple. You have to move to Pecos. It can’t just be the area. You have to move to Pecos,” Malone said.
“We also have a welcome home stipend if you are a graduate of Pecos High School, knowing that 60 percent of teachers tend to teach close to where they grew up. We also have a $1,500 stipend for those wanting to go back home,” Malone added.
She added that the starting salary for teachers is $52,000. The district pays $555 for individual medical insurance. She said she thinks the incentives have helped.
There is also a $500 stipend for people in the district who refer someone to Pecos and the district ends up signing them, if they aren’t someone that has already applied.
“I think right now it’s a teachers’ market. I think we have a lot of schools trying to get a lot of young people and I think a lot of them are still in the process of trying to decide where they want to go because they do have a lot of options. But it definitely has put us out there as competitive with districts around us and particularly in the area,” Malone said.
She added that Pecos is on the move.
“We have a lot of great things happening from new facilities to a lot of great leadership. What I’ve been doing the past few weeks at job fairs is really trying to get that information out. I think we provide a tremendous amount of support for new teachers. I think it’s really important that teachers think about how to have a great first year and I think we can help them with that,” Malone said.
“Another thing that’s really important about Pecos, which is why I tell people out of college that they should come here, is that we have a Grow Your Own program. We will pay 100% of tuition for those that are accepted into a program. We have to accept them into our Grow Your Own program, but we’ll pay for their tuition and so it’s not a reimbursement. It’s not a percentage. It’s if you’re working on something that will extend your opportunities in education we will pay for that. That’s no debt for you if you stay three years here and work on that master’s,” Malone added.
The district partners with different places.
“We have Grow Your Own for our instructional aides as they work toward teacher certification and then we have it as we help people get their master’s degree,” Malone said.
