Veterans Home Care Funding in Lake Worth, TX

Just more than a dozen community members want to serve on Lake Worth ISD’s state-appointed board of managers as compared to the nearly 300 who applied for Fort Worth’s.

Texas Education Agency officials received 14 applications for Lake Worth ISD’s board with only four living inside district boundaries, according to agency data.

Such a limited pool will shape how Texas Education Commissioner Mike Morath proceeds with the board for the 3,200-student district that’s under a state takeover because of persistent failing academic performance.

The managers will assume full governing authority while locally elected trustees remain in office without power.

Board President Tammy Thomas said the small number of in-district applicants reflects longstanding gaps in the community’s involvement with Lake Worth schools.

“With the lack of support in the district, and you see not many people at board meetings, I’m not surprised that there were this few,” Thomas said. She added, “I’m OK with them taking (applications from) people outside of the district.”

The Fort Worth Report requested the names of those seeking to serve on the board of managers.

Eight applicants are women and six are men, according to the demographic information that was disclosed. About 31% have or had children enrolled in Lake Worth schools, and a similar share have worked in the district.

Thomas said several residents initially expressed interest in serving as a manager but later backed out after learning the role required significant training and time commitments.

“They see that there’s more involved than just being on a board,” Thomas said. “A lot of people that I know backed out.”

Texas Education Agency officials indicated they expect to appoint either five or seven managers for Lake Worth, Superintendent Mark Ramirez said during the district’s Feb. 16 meeting. Previous Texas school district takeovers typically had five-member boards of managers, including in Edgewood, Southside, Marlin and Shepherd.

Lake Worth ISD has seven elected trustees.

Applicants must attend a two-day governance training for consideration. Trustees were told the managers and a new superintendent will be announced at the same time this spring, likely in April or May.

Morath ordered the takeover in December after years of students scoring low on state tests, including at the Marilyn Miller Language Academy that had five consecutive F academic accountability ratings from the state.

Morath appointed conservator Andrew Kim in January. Kim, a former superintendent, oversees and directs — as necessary — the actions of the superintendent, principals and trustees, reporting to the agency on governance activity and academic progress.

Once seated, appointed managers will oversee budgets, policy and academic improvement efforts while the state directs the district in improving learning for children.

Morath has said he will also appoint managers for the nearly 68,000-student Fort Worth ISD.

Matthew Sgroi is an education reporter for the Fort Worth Report. Contact him at [email protected] or .

At the Fort Worth Report, news decisions are made independently of our board members and financial supporters. Read more about our editorial independence policy .

The application deadline for the Lake Worth school district’s state-appointed board of managers passed Friday after it was extended 20 days due to a low number of applicants.

Just 14 people applied for the state-appointed board of managers, with more of those applicants living outside the district than inside of it, according to data provided by the Texas Education Agency.

Ten applicants reside outside the Lake Worth district, and four live in the district. Five applicants have a bachelor’s degree, three hold a master’s, three have a doctorate, and one holds an associate’s degree, TEA data shows.

Thirty-one percent of applications have or have had students who were enrolled at Lake Worth, and 31% are or were employed by the district.

Lake Worth’s applicant total is significantly lower than other districts that had a state-appointed board of managers application period in recent months and years. Fort Worth, which closed applications for its state-appointed board of managers on Dec. 1, had 286 total applicants. Lake Worth is exceptionally smaller, with a student population of around 3,300, according to district data.

Lake Worth’s low application totals come after parents of students who attend the district told the Star-Telegram that one of the main issues plaguing the struggling district is parent apathy and a lack of overall involvement.

Lake Worth’s school board, which will be replaced by the state-appointed board after the interview process concludes, has seven seats. Half of those who applied will earn a seat on the board, if another application window is not opened.

Candidates will be interviewed for Lake Worth’s board March 2-13 and TEA Commissioner Mike Morath will decide who will be named to the board shortly thereafter. There is no official timeline for Morath’s decision.

TEA took over Lake Worth in December when Marilyn Miller Language Academy received a fifth consecutive F grade by the state in its yearly accountability ratings. That triggered a Texas law allowing Morath to replace the school board and superintendent and name a conservator to oversee the takeover process. Morath has already appointed Andrew Kim, a former superintendent who is a co-conservator at an El Paso area school district, as Lake Worth’s conservator.

Lake Worth’s seven school board members unanimously voted at a meeting last month not to appeal the TEA takeover, instead blaming itself for taking “too long” to name a superintendent when the search began in September 2024. The board did not hire Superintendent Mark Ramirez until May 2025.

Had the current board appealed, it would have delayed the state-appointed board of managers process even further.

Mark Ramirez announced his resignation at a board meeting Monday night. His last day will be March 13.

LAKE WORTH, Texas — Lake Worth school superintendent Mark Ramirez has resigned amid the ongoing state takeover of the Tarrant County school district, officials announced Tuesday.

Ramirez announced his resignation at a board meeting Monday night. His last day will be March 13, less than a year after he joined the district in May of last year.

The Texas Education Agency (TEA) announced in December that it would be taking over operations of the district after all but one of its campuses received failing grades.

Despite the district's struggles, parents and teachers urged state leaders to keep Ramirez with the district, saying the newly-hired superintendent helped with recent academic gains and improvements and was a "fresh start" for the district.

However, the TEA ultimately decided that Ramirez would be replaced, so his resignation this week did not come as a surprise.

"Dr. Ramirez worked tirelessly to improve outcomes in Lake Worth ISD and strengthened the district’s ability to effectively serve students. He was an asset to the students of Lake Worth and will be an asset to the district and community he’ll serve next," TEA Commissioner Mike Morath said in a statement to WFAA.

Ramirez's resignation comes a week after the TEA announced that Fort Worth Independent School District superintendent Karen Molinar would be replaced amid the Fort Worth district's state takeover.

In a letter to Lake Worth ISD's superintendent and board of trustees in December, TEA Commissioner Mike Morath wrote that he was ordering the appointment of a board of managers and a conservator to oversee the district after TEA conducted an analysis of district data and vetted its systems, leadership and student results.

Marilyn Miller Language Academy was notified in June 2025 that it was required to put the approved Campus Turnaround Plan in place during the upcoming school year, and could submit plan updates to the TEA.

But then, that same year, the school earned its fifth consecutive unacceptable rating, a rating of "F."

That same year, Morath wrote that every campus in the district earned a rating of either an F or a C. Five campuses earned an F rating, while one campus earned a C rating.

"Unacceptable academic performance in a single year represents significant academic weakness – typically less than one-third of students in those campuses reach grade level and less than one-half of students on those campuses demonstrate a year’s worth of academic growth," Morath wrote. "When that unacceptable performance continues for multiple years, the children in those campuses develop significant academic gaps. Multi-year unacceptable ratings represent a school district’s most fundamental mission failure and a complete inability to take necessary action to provide a high quality education for students."

Morath wrote that Lake Worth ISD has also shown a chronic inability to support students to achieve and learn at high levels, with only 24% of students across all district students meeting grade level, 28% below the state average. This is worse than in 2019, Morath said, when only 27% of the district's students met grade level.