Stafford Municipal School District

The plaque calls the court fight a question of constitutionality, but at bottom it was about desegregation. A Houston federal judge enjoined the new district after finding that Fort Bend ISD was not yet a unitary, fully desegregated system. By the parties' agreement it was unitary except in hiring minority teachers: about 36 percent of students were minority, but only about 12 percent of certified staff. On July 30, 1981, Judges Brown, Wisdom and Randall reversed, finding Fort Bend's post-1973 affirmative action a good-faith effort. Its faculty had grown from 194 to 964 since 1964-65.

What the plaque says

Stafford Municipal School District The city of Stafford, or Stafford's point, was settled by William Stafford in the early 1820s. The settlers organized a place for their children to go to school, and by the 1830s, a one-room school was available with ten students attending. Later, classes were held in the local blacksmith shop. In 1895, the first official school was built on Louisiana Street in Missouri City with seven grades and one teacher. Students from Stafford, Missouri City and surrounding areas attended the Missouri City School District which was formally organized in 1938. In 1959, the Missouri City School District and Sugar Land School District consolidated to form the Fort Bend Independent School District (FBISD). In 1976, a FBISD decision to reduce bus transportation for schoolchildren prompted the Stafford City Council to consider separating from the district to create a municipal school district, an extremely rare occurrence. As required, Stafford citizens presented a petition to the mayor and City Council calling for an election to form a municipal school district. The election was held, and the vote was approved on January 15, 1977. The State of Texas Commissioner of Education investigated and upheld the vote. FBISD appealed the decision to the Federal District Court where a judge ruled in favor of FBISD. On July 30, 1981, the Fifth Circuit Court of appeals in New Orleans ruled that Stafford Municipal School District (SMSD) was constitutional. Work quickly began to establish an exceptional educational environment for Stafford. on August 26, 1982, SMSD started grades kindergarten through 5th and the next year added 6th through 11th grades. SMSD had its first graduating class in May 1985. (2016)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Museum of Fine Arts, Houston — 13 mi
  The oldest art museum in Texas, grown from a 1900 schoolroom art league into a campus of Watkin, Mies van der Rohe and later buildings, with Ima Hogg's Bayou Bend up the bayou.
• The Menil Collection — 13 mi
  John and Dominique de Menil's free museum in Montrose: a grey-sided Renzo Piano building among bungalows, holding antiquities, Surrealism and art of Oceania under natural light.
• Rothko Chapel — 13 mi
  An octagonal chapel open to all faiths, built by the de Menils around fourteen dark canvases by Mark Rothko, with Barnett Newman's Broken Obelisk standing in the pool outside.
• Buffalo Soldiers National Museum — 14 mi
  A museum in Houston's 1925 Light Guard Armory that tells the service of Black soldiers from the Revolutionary War onward, built from one veteran's thirty years of collecting.

More markers nearby

• Missouri City — 1.0 mi
• Buffalo Bayou, Brazos & Colorado, First Railroad in Texas — 1.1 mi
• Stafford Plantation — 2.5 mi
• Stafford's Point — 2.8 mi