Texas Tea: Q&A with Dr. LaTonya Goffney, Superintendent Aldine ISD

Dr. LaTonya M. Goffney is the superintendent of the Aldine Independent School District (AISD), which serves more than 60,000 students and 48% Emergent Bilinguals in North Houston. It is one of the largest school districts in the state of Texas. She previously served as superintendent of the Lufkin Independent School District and the Coldspring-Oakhurst Consolidated Independent School District. She currently serves as President of The School Superintendents Association (AASA), a national association for school system leaders. Dr. Goffney recently spoke with ELSF's Director of Texas Altagracia "Grace" Delgado. This is an excerpt of their Q & A.

1. Aldine has been one of the earliest and most consistent districts in Texas to invest deeply in high-quality instructional materials. Looking back over the past six years, what do you believe has made the biggest difference between simply adopting HQIM and building a system where those materials consistently improve teaching and learning, specifically in support of emergent bilinguals?

I think one of the biggest lessons we’ve learned over the last six years is that you can adopt the best materials in the world, but the materials alone aren’t going to change what happens for students. They’re tools. The difference is what you build around them.

For us, that meant investing just as much in our teachers and leaders as we did in the curriculum. Teachers need time to understand the materials, strong professional learning, coaching, opportunities to collaborate, and principals who know what good instruction should look like. And we’ve had to stay with it. We didn’t adopt something, train everyone once, and move on. We’ve continued to learn, adjust, and get better at implementation.

That has been especially important for our emergent bilingual students. In Aldine, we don’t believe students should have to choose between learning English and accessing rigorous academic content. They need both. Language development has to happen alongside strong instruction, not instead of it.

And I think that gets to something I feel very strongly about as a superintendent: supporting students should never mean lowering expectations for them. Our responsibility is to provide the scaffolds, language supports, great teaching, and time they need to reach those expectations.

We’re encouraged by the growth we’re seeing, including in our recent STAAR results. But I always remind people that the numbers are the outcome of what happens every day in classrooms. 

Six years later, I would say the biggest difference is pretty simple: don’t just invest in the materials. Invest in the people who bring those materials to life. That’s where the real work—and ultimately the real impact—happens.

2. Many districts continue to view curriculum adoption as a single initiative rather than part of a broader instructional strategy. How has Aldine intentionally integrated curriculum, professional learning, leadership development, and continuous improvement into one coherent instructional system to support success for ALL students?

One thing we learned early is that you can’t treat curriculum as one initiative, professional learning as another, leadership development as something else, and then expect it all to magically come together in the classroom. It has to connect.

In Aldine, we’ve worked hard to build that coherence. If we’re asking teachers to deliver high-quality, grade-level instruction, then our professional learning has to prepare them to do that. Our coaches have to reinforce it. Our principals have to know what to look for when they walk into classrooms. As a district, we analyze the data and ask, “Is this working for students? Where are we seeing variation? And what do we need to do differently?”

We want everyone—from the classroom teacher to the principal to the central office—working from the same understanding of what excellent instruction looks like and taking responsibility for getting better at it.

And that absolutely includes our emergent bilingual students. In a district as diverse as Aldine, supporting multilingual learners can’t be something that sits off to the side or belongs to one department. It has to be part of how we think about instruction across the entire district. We maintain high expectations while making sure students have the language supports and scaffolds they need to fully engage in grade-level learning.

I’m also a big believer that multilingualism is a strength. Our students bring their languages, cultures, experiences, and perspectives into our classrooms, and those things make Aldine stronger.

So for us, this has never been about implementing a curriculum. It’s about building an instructional system. 

3. Aldine serves one of the largest populations of emergent bilingual students in Texas, with 48% of the student body being EBs. Your academic gains demonstrate that rigorous instruction and multilingual learner success can go hand in hand. How has the district ensured that HQIM implementation strengthens its commitment to bilingualism, biliteracy, and equitable access for emergent bilingual students?

In Aldine, we see a student’s home language as an asset, not a barrier. We want our emergent bilingual students to develop strong academic skills while also becoming bilingual and biliterate. Those goals don’t compete with one another—they strengthen one another.

As we implemented HQIM, we were very intentional about making sure we didn’t lose that commitment. Rigorous, grade-level instruction should be accessible to every student, but access doesn’t mean every student needs exactly the same thing in exactly the same way.

Our bilingual programs are an important part of that work. We offer both one-way and two-way dual language instruction, and we provide our teachers with guiding documents that help bridge English and Spanish instruction. That bridging is important because biliteracy isn’t simply teaching the same lesson twice in two different languages. We want students making connections across languages and using what they know in one language to strengthen their learning in the other.

HQIM has actually helped us create greater consistency in that work. Instead of asking individual teachers to spend their time trying to create curriculum from scratch, we have a strong common instructional foundation. That allows our bilingual and multilingual specialists, coaches, teachers, and campus leaders to spend more of their energy on the important question: How do we make this rigorous content accessible to the students sitting in front of us while continuing to develop their language and literacy?

For me, the connection between HQIM and our commitment to emergent bilingual students is this: the materials give us consistency and rigor. Our bilingual and biliteracy practices help ensure students can access that rigor, build on the language assets they already possess, and ultimately graduate with more—not fewer—opportunities available to them.

4. Many districts experience strong implementation in the first year but struggle to maintain momentum. What leadership structures and organizational practices have allowed Aldine to sustain high-quality implementation over multiple years while continuing to improve student outcomes?

The first year of any major effort usually comes with a lot of energy and excitement. Everybody is focused on it. The real test is what happens in year two, year three, and beyond, when the work gets harder and something new is competing for everyone’s attention.

One of the things we’ve learned in Aldine is that lasting improvement doesn’t come from constantly launching the next new initiative. Sometimes the most important leadership decision you can make is to stay the course, get better at what you’re already doing, and give people the time and support to do it well.

That requires discipline at every level of the organization. Our principals have to understand what strong instruction looks like and be able to support it on their campuses. Our instructional leaders and coaches have to be aligned in the support they provide teachers. And at the district level, we have to keep paying attention to implementation—not just whether something was rolled out, but whether it is actually happening consistently and making a difference for students.

We’ve also tried to make continuous improvement part of how we operate. We look at student outcomes, but we also look at the practices producing those outcomes. We ask: What’s working? Where are we seeing variation? What can we learn from the schools and classrooms getting strong results? And where do we need to provide additional support?

The work happens in classrooms. Our job as leaders is to create the conditions for our educators to do their best work—to provide clarity, resources, professional learning, support, and then stay focused long enough for the work to take root.

Sustaining improvement isn’t always exciting. It requires discipline, patience, and sometimes the courage to say, “We don’t need something new. We need to get even better at what we know works.” That’s how you build improvement that lasts.

5. Aldine has embraced technology, analytics, and innovation as part of its instructional strategy. How do you determine which innovations genuinely strengthen teaching and learning for underserved students such as emergent bilinguals, versus those that simply add complexity, and how has technology supported the successful implementation of HQIM across the district?

As leaders, we have to be careful not to adopt something simply because it’s new. I always come back to a pretty simple question: Will this help teachers teach more effectively and help students learn more deeply?

If the answer isn’t clear, then we need to ask why we’re adding it.

We also have to remember that some of the most powerful practices in education aren’t new at all. Great teaching is still about relationships, knowing your students, thoughtful planning, meaningful feedback, strong content, and high expectations. Technology should strengthen those things, not compete with them or make the work unnecessarily complicated.

That has been our approach in Aldine. With HQIM, technology has helped us create greater access and consistency across a very large school system. It gives teachers easier access to instructional materials and resources, supports collaboration and professional learning, and gives our leaders better information to understand what is happening across classrooms and campuses. The analytics also help us identify patterns in student learning so we can respond more quickly when students or teachers need additional support.

For our emergent bilingual students, technology can provide additional ways to access grade-level content, develop academic language, practice skills, and demonstrate their learning. But we’re thoughtful about that, too. A digital tool should support the instruction the teacher is providing—not become a substitute for rich conversations, complex texts, collaboration, or the productive struggle that is part of learning.

I always come back to this: technology is a tool. It is not the teacher. The most powerful resource in any classroom is still a great educator who knows their students, understands what they need, builds relationships, and knows how to move their learning forward.

6. As President of AASA, you have the opportunity to observe instructional transformation across the country. What lessons from Aldine's experience do you believe have national relevance, particularly for districts serving large populations of emergent bilingual students?

Serving as AASA President has been an incredible honor because it has given me the opportunity to learn from school leaders across the country. The school systems making progress share many of the same commitments. They invest in their people. They build strong relationships. They maintain high expectations for every student. And they remain focused on what matters most — the success of children. That has certainly been true in Aldine. 

One lesson I believe has national relevance is how we think about our emergent bilingual students. Our students bring tremendous strengths into our classrooms. Their languages, cultures, and experiences are assets. The question has never been whether our students are capable of achieving at high levels. The question is whether we are creating the conditions that allow them to reach those levels.

That means providing excellent instruction, strong support systems, and educators who believe deeply in what students can accomplish. Across the country, I have seen what is possible when leaders approach multilingual learners from a place of opportunity rather than limitation. When we recognize students' strengths and provide the right support, they continue to show us what they can do.

Every child deserves access to excellent teaching, and every educator deserves the support necessary to provide it.

7. From your perspective, what is the biggest challenge Texas district leaders face in executing their vision for supporting emergent bilinguals? What type of support or resources are most helpful that organizations like ELSF can offer?

I think one of the biggest challenges for Texas district leaders right now is capacity. There is no shortage of good ideas or good intentions. The challenge is making sure our teachers and leaders have the time, training, resources, and support to actually execute the vision well.

And when you serve large numbers of emergent bilingual students, you have to be very intentional. Supporting multilingual learners can’t become one more thing on a long list of initiatives. It has to be part of how you think about teaching and learning across the entire system.

For organizations like ELSF, I think some of the most valuable support is helping districts translate research into practice. Superintendents and instructional leaders don’t necessarily need another hundred-page report telling us what the research says. We need help answering, “What does this actually look like in a classroom? What does it look like at scale? And how do we know if we’re doing it well?”

Professional learning is important, but so are opportunities for leaders and practitioners to learn from one another. Show us districts that are getting results. Create spaces where teachers, principals, instructional leaders, and superintendents can talk candidly about what’s working, what isn’t, and what they’ve learned along the way. And help us develop practical tools that can be used in classrooms and across systems.

We don’t have to solve every challenge by ourselves. Organizations like ELSF can help connect the research, the resources, and, most importantly, the people. When we learn from one another and stay focused on what students need, we all get better.

8. What last words of encouragement or lessons learned would you give to leaders who are struggling to understand how to improve academic outcomes for their students, particularly their emergent bilingual populations? 

I would encourage leaders to start with one simple belief: Every child is capable of achieving at high levels. You have to believe that before the data changes. You have to believe it for every child—including the student who is still learning English, the student who has fallen behind, and the student who may not yet believe it for themselves.  That belief has to show up in our actions.

Improving academic outcomes is hard work. There are going to be times when the data doesn’t move as quickly as you want it to. My encouragement is: don’t lose sight of the students while you’re trying to move the numbers.

For our emergent bilingual students especially, never confuse learning a new language with a lack of ability. What a student can communicate in English today is not a measure of that student’s intelligence or potential. Maintain the rigor. Provide the support. Honor the language and strengths they already bring. And give them the opportunity to show you what they can do.

Because ultimately, this work is about hope. And I’ve learned that hope is not passive. Hope requires action. It is showing up every day, doing the work, learning from what isn’t working, getting better, and continuing to believe that our students deserve our very best.

So my encouragement to leaders is simple: Keep students at the center. Keep believing. And keep doing the work.

We have the privilege of helping young people discover what is possible for their future. I can’t think of a greater responsibility—or a greater opportunity—than that.

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ELSF offers hands-on support for Texas districts and publishers working to strengthen instructional materials for emergent bilingual students. Learn more about our services for districts and our services for content developers.

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