The Fort Worth school board has named Midland Superintendent Angélica Ramsey as the lone finalist for the top job in the Fort Worth Independent School District.
As the board’s lone finalist, Ramsey will finish out the next three weeks in Midland before joining the Fort Worth school district. Ramsey began her teaching career in El Paso after leaving the Army and also has served in various posts in two California school districts.
Ramsey, in comments to the media after her selection, said challenges are solved by talking to those closest to the problem. She promised a student-focused agenda and opportunities for two-way conversations with families, staff and the community.
“The acknowledgement of this board that that’s exactly what we should be doing — that we should be bringing everyone in before we make a decision — really made me feel at ease,” Ramsey said, adding she also was super excited. “And as I said, embarrassingly, also a little emotional when I received the phone call.”
Trustees, assisted by the search firm of Hazard, Young, Attea & Associates, interviewed six candidates in early August. The decision to name Ramsey comes a day before outgoing Superintendent Kent Scribner leaves the school district.
Ramsey got a taste of what she will be faced with at Fort Worth ISD during public comments. Some, like Steven Poole of the United Educators Association, were committed to Ramsey’s success.
“Every new superintendent brings new hope and new opportunities, and the same goes for the superintendent that you’ll be naming tonight,” Poole said. “Our students, our staff and our parents have worked very hard over the last year to get us where we are, and we are on an upward trajectory.”
If Fort Worth wants successful students, the district needs successful teachers, Poole said. For teachers to be successful, Fort Worth needs successful schools. “And for all of that to occur, we need our superintendent to be successful,” he said.
District critics who spoke greeted Ramsey’s name with suspicion. More than one viewed her doctoral dissertation at Liberty University — an extended study of 10 Latina school leaders — as a call for critical race theory. Others were critical of her tenure in Midland and especially critical of a gang-related student death.
Ramsey, asked directly about her dissertation, described it as an exploration of the obstacles Latina women faced when pursuing a pathway to a principal position. Applicants often hesitate to apply because they don’t think they are 100% qualified, Ramsey said.
“We have some characteristics that are really, really well-suited for being school leaders,” said Ramsey, who is Latina. “We listen more than we speak. We treat children as though they’re our own. And, culturally, because it was a study of Latina leaders, we believe in family, so we take our school community and treat them as family.”
The vote to choose Ramsey was unanimous. Before the vote, trustees offered supportive statements about Ramsey. Trustee Michael Ryan said the board’s focus was to pick a leader who recognized “every child from every part of this city, facing every circumstance, deserves the best that our teachers, staff and administration can deliver within the budget that we set.”
Ramsey spent just over a year leading the Midland school district. Announcing her nomination, Board President Tobi Jackson pointed to Ramsey’s accomplishments in Midland: development of a profile of a district learner; an updated strategic plan; a long-range facilities plan; and the establishment of an achievement one.
“Midland ISD now has an equitably aligned budget and has doubled the number of its ‘A’ and ‘B’ rated schools,” Jackson said.