Raise Your Hand Texas Announces Trustee Advocates Program

CONTACT:
Tessa Benavides-Cooper
tbenavides@ryht.org 

New fellowship program to elevate Texas school boards, district superintendents’ expertise on state education policy

AUSTIN, TEXAS — Raise Your Hand Texas’ Trustee Advocates program will give Texas school boards and their superintendents the tools they need to find, use and amplify their voices and the voices of communities to influence state education policy.

Across Texas, school trustees provide education oversight and citizen governance to ensure our public schools meet the expectations of our local communities,” said Dr. Libby Cohn, Raise Your Hand Texas’ Director of Advocacy and Outreach. “These local leaders bring critically important expertise and insight that will be valuable to state policymakers.”

Over the course of the inaugural 18-month fellowship, Trustee Advocates will learn to build a local public education advocacy network that encourages community connectedness and influences state legislative outcomes.

“Board trustees and superintendents are on the front lines of public education and are deeply invested in their communities and schools,” said Cohen. “Supporting and strengthening our schools takes all of us, and the Trustee Advocates Program will help equip these local leaders to amplify the voices of their communities at the Capitol

Applications for the inaugural 2022-2023 cohort opened Oct. 15, 2021 and will end Nov. 15, 2021. Fellowships will be announced in January 2022, and the program will commence in February.

Competitive grants for the inaugural fellowship cohort will be awarded to trustees and superintendents in eight (8) public school districts across Texas. The Trustee Advocates Program work will be issue-based, non-partisan, and held in accordance with the Open Meetings Act. As a Texas Education Agency-registered provider of continuing education, Raise Your Hand will award continuing education credit to participants for the hours spent in training.

All Texas school districts are eligible to apply to become members of the inaugural cohort of the Trustee Advocate program. For more information about the program or to submit an application, visit https://www.raiseyourhandtexas.org/advocacy/trustee-advocacy-program. 

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ABOUT THE RAISE YOUR HAND TEXAS

Raise Your Hand Texas supports public policy solutions that invest in our students, encourage innovation and autonomy, and improve college and workforce readiness. For more information, visit RaiseYourHandTexas.org.

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