Friendswood has approved its fiscal year 2025-26 budget and tax rate, which matches last year’s rate. 

The details: Friendswood City Council voted unanimously to approve the proposed tax rate of $0.514172 per $100 valuation at its Sept. 8 meeting.

What else: The city approved a $116.8 million budget for FY 2025-26, which begins Oct.1 and runs through Sept. 30, 2026. Last year, Friendswood approved a $108.2 million budget.

Friendswood ISD’s board of trustees approved the school safety and health advisory committees at its Sept. 8 meeting.

What you need to know: The school safety advisory committee assists in overseeing the district’s emergency operations plan, audits FISD’s safety and security, collaborates with local emergency agencies, reviews mental health interventions, and reviews proposals and funding for major safety projects, according to board documents.

What else: Trustees also approved members for the district's school health advisory committee, or SHAC, to assist the district in ensuring that local community values are reflected in health education instruction.
 

Austin-based private school Alpha School is aiming to expedite learning for more students using artificial intelligence at new academies opening across the country.

What happened: On Sept. 9, U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon visited Alpha School in Austin alongside Texas Education Agency Commissioner Mike Morath. Alpha School co-founder MacKenzie Price highlighted how the school is using AI to personalize and improve students’ education.

What they're saying: “It's the most exciting thing I've seen in education in a long time,” McMahon said about Alpha School. “I'm incredibly enthusiastic about this.”

How it works: Students complete their academic learning in two hours each day using an AI platform known as 2 Hour Learning. Price said the Alpha School model enables students to learn twice as fast as they would in a traditional school setting.

The update: Alpha School opened several new academies across the United States this school year, including a K-3 school in Plano and K-8 school in Fort Worth. The company is planning to open an academy in Houston this winter.

An increasing jail population, slower case processing and increasing court backlog delays are among the potential consequences Harris County judges and other judicial officials warned commissioners about Sept. 9 if several initiatives go unfunded.

The context: Harris County commissioners and department leaders are weighing how to offset at least $102 million in cuts before adopting the fiscal year 2025-26 budget on Sept. 18.

More details: Harris County Criminal Court Judge Stacy Barrow serves on the 487th district court and asked Commissioners Court to fund $2.2 million toward the associate judge program, which covers 12 staff positions and serves several court functions, judges said, including assisting with case processing, handling bond cases and covering court dockets during weekends and holiday shifts.

 “Our request today is [for] Commissioners Court is to partner with us in progress to fund the felony associate judge program for an additional year in response to the shift in [the] criminal justice landscape," Barrow said.