ODESSA, Texas — The Ector County ISD school board voted in its December meeting to allow the school district and University of Texas Permian Basin STEM Academy to look into contract negotiations for a potential partnership that would bring UTPB STEM under the ECISD umbrella.
Students in ECISD have the potential to participate in fine arts, sports and other extracurricular activities. According to UTPB STEM's superintendent, Shannon Davidson, her students may have missed out on some of those opportunities at the STEM academy.
"It’s all about new opportunities for our students," Davidson said. "We believe that our students have had a fantastic STEM education, but maybe they’ve missed out on some of the other experiences, like sports and fine arts. And so those are some of the things that our families are most excited about."
However, those aren't the only areas that these STEM students might be able to benefit from.
"There’s also other student services, like transportation and food services," Davidson said. "We're excited to look into their innovation department and collaborate with them. We’re also looking forward to learning more about their CTE programs."
There are some big questions that UTPB STEM plans to look into. One of these includes figuring which schools students will look into for their extracurricular activities.
"That is one of the things that over the next couple of months that we'll have to really be working with ECISD on what would be the best for our students, and for ECISD and for us," Davidson said. "So I’m not quite sure the answer to that just yet, but we'll work on that."
So far, Davidson said that they have received positive feedback from parents about this potential partnership.
"I think people are mostly excited about those new opportunities, and I really think that the community feels that this partnership will allow us to take our school and our students to that next level," Davidson said.
The ECISD school board said that a more concrete decision on this potential partnership could possibly come during the March school board meeting.