By DAVID LOPEZ
Special to the NEWS
RIO HONDO—Last week, the Rio Hondo ISD Board of Trustees hired Raul J. Treviño as the district’s Superintendent of Schools. Treviño provided an interview to the NEWS detailing his vision for the school district.
Q: How does it feel to be chosen for the role of Superintendent?
A: I’m very humbled and honored to have been selected by the school board. I feel very blessed that God has given me the opportunity to serve the community as Superintendent of Schools. I’m elated at the opportunity and I’m looking forward to continuing working with our community and our staff to do what’s best for our students.
Q: What is your vision for the district?
A: My vision would be to continue focusing all of our efforts to ensure that every child in our school system achieves academic excellence and success and that they’re able to develop and realize their full potential with their gifts and talents.
Q: What are some of the challenges facing the district that you are looking to tackle?
A: I think one of the challenges that we have is that we are a 3-A district surrounded by 6-As. That’s a challenge for us because have to compete with districts like San Benito, Los Fresnos, and Harlingen, which are all within a few miles of where we are. Our programming has to be on the level with the programming that students can get in the surrounding districts. That was one of the catalysts that brought me to the point of wanting to build our high school opportunities in P-TECH (Pathways to Technology Early College High School), which we are now. When I first got to Rio Hondo four years ago, we were offering some dual enrollment courses, but there was no certification for students. Now that we are a P-TECH, we’re offering the types of things that 6-A districts are offering, so students can now graduate from high school with an associate’s degree. We have a partnership with Texas Southmost College and TSTC for some of the technical fields like mechatronics, HVAC, wind energy technician, building construction technology and several other things. We’ve developed partnerships with Valley Baptist Hospital so that our students can become medical technicians as well. There are a lot of things we’ve done in the last four years to give our students a reason to stay to fulfill their college and career goals.
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