Mike Morath

Mike Morath

Nonpartisan

Texas Commissioner of Education

Tenure

2016 - Present

Term ends

2026

Years in position

9

Predecessor

Michael Williams

Prior offices

Dallas Independent School District, District 2

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Compensation

Base salary

$220,375

Elections and appointments

Appointed

2016

Education

Bachelor's

George Washington University

Personal

Profession

Executive

Mike Morath is the Texas Commissioner of Education. Morath assumed office on January 4, 2016. Morath's current term ends on June 30, 2026.

Biography

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Morath served on the Dallas Independent School Board for four years. While on the board, he also managed a small portfolio of investments at Morath Investments. Prior to his time on the board, Morath served as the president and COO of Minute Menu Systems for a decade. This firm administers food programs for low-income kids throughout the United States. He has also been involved with community organizations like Big Brothers Big Sisters and the Addison Rotary Club.

Previously, Morath served on the Dallas Board of Trustees.

Education

• B.B.A. in finance, George Washington University

Political career

Texas Commissioner of Education (2016 - Present)

Morath was sworn in as Texas commissioner of education on January 4, 2016.

Board member, Dallas Board of Trustees, District 2 (2011-2016)

Morath represented District 2 on the Dallas Board of Trustees in Texas. He first won election to the board in 2011. Morath won re-election without opposition in the general election on May 10, 2014. District 2 covers schools in the north and near-east sides of Dallas.

Morath resigned from the board to serve in his new role as commissioner of education. A special election will be held to fill the remainder of his term.

Charter Schools

Morath was involved in the creation of Support Our Public Schools, a local group funded by former hedge fund manager John Arnold. The group gathered petitions to turn the district into a home-rule charter district. The petition drive gathered enough signatures to require the school board to create a 15-member charter commission by June 23, 2014. For more information about the home-rule charter process, jump to the section titled "Home-rule effort by Support Our Public Schools."

Elections

2014

See also: Dallas Independent School District elections (2014)

Mike Morath sought re-election to the District 2 seat without opposition in the general election on May 10, 2014.

Results

Morath won re-election without opposition when he did not face any opposition after the ballot deadline.

Funding

Morath reported $58,969.70 in contributions and $342.01 in expenditures to the school district office, leaving his campaign with $58,627.69 on hand prior to the election.

Endorsements

Educate Dallas, a political action committee run by the Dallas Regional Chamber, endorsed Morath on March 5, 2014.

2011

Morath won election to the District 2 seat without an election in May 2011.

Campaign themes

2014

Morath's campaign website listed themes for his 2014 campaign:

“	The district has already made great strides at improving our school system. Over the past 5 years, graduation rates have climbed from 62% to 81%. But we've got much work to do, and it won't be easy. I've learned a lot from folks in the community and from education experts. There isn't a silver bullet, but here are a few key priorities: 1. Spend Smarter We spend about $130,000 per student for all grades K-12, but that spending isn't properly front-loaded to ensure all children can read by 3rd grade, missing the opportunity to lay a strong foundation. Furthermore, the lack of automation throughout the district means we are wasting huge amounts of staff time (and money) on basic administrative tasks. And when we look at spending in the schools, we must focus on retaining the people who are most effective at improving student outcomes. 2. Empower Principals One of the keys to the success of a school is its campus leadership team. Good principals foster an environment where good teachers can shine. We need more effective professional development programs for district principals. This means implementing cost-effective programs to develop great principals by using the right partners who are ready and willing to help the district. It means giving principals the freedom to do their jobs without bureaucratic meddling, and holding them accountable for student achievement. 3. Partner with Parents Families are the single most important factor in a child’seducation. It is simple economics -– without parental participation, we are forced to invest far more in our schools, and we get far less. So schools must work with parents, encouraging active family involvement in schools while providing parents the tools they need to inspire learning. We must expect more from our students, but that means expecting more from everyone. WORKING TOGETHER The best ideas in the world go nowhere unless the board and administration agree that those ideas are important. So it's important for any trustee to commit to be part of a hard-working team, and to try to foster relationships based on trust and mutual respect. I pledge to do everything in my power to work with fellow trustees and the administration to move the district forward. Working together, we can make our schools better.	”
—Mike Morath's campaign website, (2014)

Issues in the district

Home-rule effort by Support Our Public Schools

Volunteers with a local group called Support Our Public Schools circulated petitions starting on March 4, 2014, to turn the Dallas Independent School District into a home-rule district. A state law passed in 1995 allows local residents to replace their existing district structure with a home-rule charter. This charter could bypass some state regulations including minimum salary schedules for teachers, curriculum standards and the number of days in a school year. On January 20, 2015, a commission voted 10-5 against granting Dallas a home-rule charter. Commission members had until June 2015 to develop a home-rule charter for the district. If approved by the Texas Commissioner of Education, voters would have approved or rejected the charter at the polls. State law requires a simple majority and at least 25 percent of registered voters to cast ballots in the charter election.

Support Our Public Schools was a group funded by former hedge fund manager John Arnold and several anonymous donors through his nonprofit organization, the Action Now Initiative. Arnold worked with local officials, including board member Mike Morath, to form the group due to concerns about the district's record of academic performance. Morath supported Support Our Public Schools but did not serve on the group's board. The organization hoped to complete the entire process in time for the gubernatorial election on November 4, 2014. If successful, Dallas Independent School District would have been the first school district in Texas to use the home-rule charter process.

Support Our Public Schools submitted more than 48,000 petition signatures to the school district in May 2014. District officials certified that enough valid signatures were submitted to proceed to the next step in the process. The group had to gather at least 24,459 valid signatures, or five percent of registered voters in the district, to force the creation of a charter commission by the school board. School board members appointed 15 members to the charter commission during a meeting on June 19, 2014.

Two members of the commission were selected by the entire board, four educators were selected by an advisory panel and each trustee selected one commission member. D. Marcus Ranger, the husband of former trustee Carla Ranger, and Lew Blackburn, Jr., the son of trustee Lew Blackburn Sr., were appointed to the commission. The state's home-rule charter law does not restrict spouses or relatives of current board members from serving on commissions. An article published following the failure of the home-rule effort noted that eight of the nine Dallas board members opposed the initiative, which Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings suggested resulted in anti-initiative appointees. Commission chairman Bob Weiss rejected this argument and stated, "I certainly respect the mayor’s point of view but will politely disagree with the inference that the process was doomed because the commission did not act in good faith. This commission was not responsible for the appointment process."

The following table details the charter commission, including how they were appointed:

Charter commission
Member	Appointed by
Bob Weiss	Entire board
Stephanie Elizalde	Entire board
Melissa Malonson	District 1 trustee Elizabeth Jones
Edwin Flores	District 2 trustee Mike Morath
Jeff Veazey	District 3 trustee Dan Micciche
Ricardo Mendez	District 4 trustee Nancy Bingham
Lew Blackburn, Jr.	District 5 trustee Lew Blackburn Sr.
D. Marcus Ranger	District 6 trustee Carla Ranger
Jerome Garza	District 7 trustee Eric Cowan
Danae Gutierrez	District 8 trustee Miguel Solis
Shirley Ison-Newsome	District 9 trustee Bernadette Nutall
Isaac Freeman	Advisory panel
Ron Oliver	Advisory panel
Bonita Reece	Advisory panel
Julie Sandel	Advisory panel

Local officials and advocates debated the group's efforts during the petition drive. Mayor Rawlings supported the effort in order to bring change to the district while board members Lew Blackburn and Bernadette Nutall questioned the motivations of Support Our Public Schools. Superintendent Mike Miles neither endorsed nor rejected the movement but argued the home-rule effort was unnecessary since the district had already initiated reforms. Alliance-AFT president Rena Honea argued that this effort was "part of a plan to underfund our schools, declare them a failure, and contract out to private operators the control of our neighborhood schools, disenfranchising parents and community stakeholders and de-professionalizing teaching."

Mark Melton, a local attorney and charter supporter, published a seven-page constitution in May 2014 intended to guide the charter commission. This constitution developed by Melton and four colleagues would have left the district largely unchanged. The document proposed a three-term limit on all board members, a provision for recalling board members and an earlier start date for district schools. Melton's proposal would have allowed a recall election to take place if 15 percent of residents in a trustee district signed petitions. He offered the proposals as a reaction to the rancorous debate taking place between Support Our Public Schools volunteers and some district residents.

Investigation into superintendent legal bills

In late 2013, the Board of Trustees solicited legal opinions regarding legal fees accrued by Superintendent Mike Miles during an investigation into a contract awarded earlier in the year. Miles was billed $18,143 by law firm Adams, Lynch and Loftin for representation during a hearing by arbitrator Paul Coggins in July 2013. The district paid the superintendent's legal fees due to a clause in his contract that covers fees for legal proceedings. The board heard legal opinions during a February 13, 2014 meeting to determine if reimbursement was appropriate for an internal investigation. Coggins did not find any wrongdoing by Miles in awarding contracts but determined that Miles talked to witnesses throughout the investigation. The final report by Coggins also found that Miles helped write a resignation letter for a former district official that criticized the Board of Trustees. Miles was given a 90-day employee improvement period and a letter of reprimand after the hearing.

Recent news

This section links to a Google news search for the term "Mike + Morath + Dallas + School + District"

Mike Morath News Feed

See also

• Dallas Independent School District, Texas
• Dallas Independent School District elections (2014)

External links

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Footnotes

Political offices
Preceded by Michael Williams	Texas Commissioner of Education 2016-Present	Succeeded by -
Preceded by -	Dallas Independent School District, District 2 2011-2016	Succeeded by -