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WACO — School bells and announcements are absent from the school day at campuses operated by Third Future Schools.
Teachers hired by the nonprofit charter firm tend to earn premium salaries, but they must stick to a tight script and work a longer school day and school calendar than their peers. The school doors are open from 6:30 a.m. to 6 p.m., offering free before- and after-school care.
Third Future and the districts that have hired it to turn around schools say the firm has a track record of success, but for a price.
The Waco Independent School District is expected to be the latest in Texas to contract with the firm in an effort to prevent state intervention.
Waco ISD officials late this week said contract negotiations were still underway and they will not have cost estimates for the Third Future partnership until Monday, the day the school board is set to approve a contract to run South Waco and Dean Highland elementary schools. The special meeting is at 5 p.m. at Waco High School cafeteria.
Third Future Schools officials this month have declined interview requests regarding how the partnership would work, and Waco ISD Superintendent Tiffany Spicer was unavailable this week for an interview. Waco ISD offers a video generally explaining the effort on its website.
Waco ISD on Friday provided the Waco Bridge with information it requested March 2 under the Texas Public Information Act, seeking district emails regarding Third Future. That information is still being reviewed.
Making inroads
A look at other Texas school districts that have partnered with Third Future shows that the firm takes an unconventional and highly scripted approach to instruction.
Third Future has run schools in Ector County, Midland, Beaumont, Austin and Jasper ISDs. Killeen, San Antonio and Edgewood ISDs recently approved partnerships with Third Future Schools.
Like Waco ISD, those districts were seeking to turn around low-performing schools that threatened to trigger state intervention. In Waco ISD, South Waco Elementary has had four years of “F” grades in the state accountability system, and a fifth failing grade could trigger a state takeover of the entire district. Dean Highland has had three consecutive failing grades.
Senate Bill 1882 allows school districts to partner with third parties to run struggling schools through an in-district charter system, shielding them from intervention for two years and providing extra state funding. Third Future Schools, founded by state-appointed Houston ISD Superintendent Mike Miles, is the only charter system approved by the Texas Education Agency to run multiple schools.
Financial information on Texas schools run by Third Future is not readily available.
Wichita Falls ISD officials said they agreed to pay Third Future $375,000 per month to run Hirschi Middle School starting in fall 2025. Based on a nine-month calendar, that would be $3.3 million a year.
Based on that school’s enrollment of 650, the per-student payment to Third Future is about $5,076 per year. Wichita Falls ISD officials say that fee includes “for teachers, administrators, and associated costs,” a Wichita Falls ISD spokesperson said by email Friday.
South Waco Elementary has an enrollment of about 610, while Dean Highland has 573. If Third Future were to charge $5,076 per student in Waco ISD for those schools, it would receive about $6 million a year. However, Waco ISD officials said that per-student expenditure at a Wichita Falls middle school is not necessarily applicable to a Waco elementary.
Waco ISD budgeted $5.1 million for South Waco Elementary and $4.8 million for Dean Highland Elementary in 2025-26, with staffing accounting for the lion’s share of that cost.
Mindset shift
For Wichita Falls ISD, Third Future Schools was the answer the district had been seeking to keep a struggling campus from triggering a takeover.
Officials said the change in campus culture since Third Future Schools began operating the school four months ago is stark.
“We knew that we can’t just do school like we normally think of school and get results and results fast,” Wichita Falls ISD Superintendent Donny Lee said. “We had to have results, fast and sustained results. So that’s what we did.”
At Hirschi Middle School and other Third Future schools, the firm tends to hire teachers from outside the district and pay them a higher salary, starting at $75,000. Standard starting pay is $51,000 in Wichita Falls ISD and $54,000 in Waco ISD.
In Midland ISD, Third Future offered an additional $10,000 hiring bonus, according to a 2022-2023 Third Future Schools staffing plan.
Under SB 1882, districts can apply for additional state aid to offset the cost of a partnership. Wichita Falls received $800,000 in state aid for this school to offset $3.3 million a year in Third Future costs. Wichita Falls officials said it’s too early to compare total costs for Hirschi Middle School before and after the contract.
Meanwhile, Manor ISD east of Austin received $779,000 in grant funds from the TEA in 2025 as part of entering into an 1882 partnership for Third Future Schools to oversee Manor Middle School.
Wichita Falls’ superintendent said the agreement with Third Future schools has yielded significant academic gains at Hirschi Middle School. In four months, students have had the equivalent of 1.6 years in academic growth, he said. Student academic growth will reach three years’ growth in a year’s time, he said.
When Lee started at Wichita Falls ISD in 2022, Hirschi had several years of failing ratings from 2016 to 2019. District officials felt the school needed a bold, radical approach to turn around the campus, he said.
“We’ve tried the traditional thing, of everything that you can imagine under the sun, and we just aren’t getting those results,” Lee said. “So for us, it was time to try this. We’re anxiously awaiting our results in August to see how much our students have improved from an academic standpoint, particularly in math and reading. We have full confidence that we’re fixing to see something pretty spectacular.”
Since Third Future Schools took control of Hirschi, there has been a noticeable culture shift, Lee said.
Students are on task and engaged in daily learning. Teachers are using timers to ensure every minute of instruction is used. There are no bells and no announcements because Third Future Schools do not use them. Every minute of instruction is scripted.
Teachers spend three to four minutes instructing students. Then they check for students’ understanding of the material, Lee said.
Students are asked to hold a whiteboard with the answer, share with a partner or peer to check they understand. After a learning demonstration of 20 minutes, students receive five questions to assess their understanding. Students who receive an A for advanced are able to move on to the learning center to continue learning at a higher level. Students who miss more than two questions stay and re-learn the material, Lee said.
“Now the smart kids aren’t punished for being smart, having to sit there for 20 minutes twiddling their thumbs,” Lee said. “They get enriched instruction.”
Students at the learning center then work on their computers using IXL software.
“There’s no such thing as free time,” Lee said.
Wichita Falls ISD is expanding the partnership with Third Future Schools to include two elementary schools. Southern Hills and Booker T. Washington elementary schools feed into Hirschi Middle School.
Although the district has not seen changes in enrollment since partnering with Third Future Schools, it did see the majority of the staff leave, with three to five teachers remaining.
“But a lot of the teachers that have come in that are teaching at Hirschi have come in from outside the city of Wichita Falls from all over the state,” Lee said.
