Most Failing Schools in Texas, Two Years Running
Austin ISD earned a B this year but has more F-rated campuses than any other in Texas, more than Dallas, Houston, and Fort Worth combined, and two schools just crossed the line that lets the state take over. Both things are true.
On the night of August 13, the Austin ISD board celebrated. The district’s overall rating had risen from a C to a B, an 81 out of 100, its first B in four years. Superintendent Matias Segura called it “a big, big deal” and said the district’s academic outcomes are “moving in the right direction.” The next morning, the Texas Education Agency released the underlying numbers, and the Austin American-Statesman reported the part the celebration did not lead with: Austin ISD has 20 F-rated campuses, the most of any school district in Texas, for the second year in a row.
Both statements are accurate. The district did improve, and the district is failing more schools than anyone else in the state. Holding both at once is the only honest way to read this year’s results, so here is how they fit together.
The B, and what it averages
Austin’s B is real, and it deserves two pieces of context the celebration left out.
The first is that the tide rose for everyone. Statewide, the share of F-rated campuses fell from 8 percent in 2024 to 4 percent in 2026, and 24 percent of districts moved up a letter grade. Austin improved in a year when most of Texas improved.
The second is that Austin has been here before. The district’s rating history runs B/88 in 2021-22, then C/77, C/77, C/79, and now B/81. This year’s B is not a breakthrough. It is a return to a grade lower than the district earned before the last few years of decline.
And the district’s overall academic average is not the problem. On the STAAR test, Austin ISD sits at or above the state average across the board: 54 percent of its students met grade level against 52 percent statewide, 58 percent in reading against 56, 48 percent in math against 47, and 29 percent mastered grade level against 24. A district performing at the state average does not, by arithmetic alone, end up with the most failing schools in Texas. Something other than the average is driving that.
