Lindsey Fuller is 40, a mother of three, a holder of two jobs, a divorcee, a renter, a Subaru driver, a lifelong Arlington resident, a poker player and a proud Texas Rangers devotee.
She is also a self-described busybody who can’t sit still.
Which is probably just as well. Sitting still doesn’t seem to be an option for parents with children in public schools these days.
Two days after Arlington ISD staged its annual staff pep rally — they call it Convocation — Fuller was sitting in the children’s section of the downtown library.
She was feeling two things about the new school year: excitement and dread.
Excitement because there is something hopeful about a new school year. New teachers. New classes. Everybody gets to start 0-0. A do-over, so to speak.
The dread comes from knowing how quickly 0-0 can become something quite different.
“You just want the best for your kids, but sometimes no matter how hard you try, the system is what dictates what happens to them,” she said.
Then she sighed.
“I’m just going to roll with it.”
That sounded a little cryptic, so I’ll explain.
When thousands of Arlington ISD employees jammed into UT Arlington’s College Park Center last month to celebrate the coming school year, they did so with a few elephants squeezed into the arena with them.
Public school enrollment is declining in many districts. Academic scores are under scrutiny. Teachers are bolting from the profession. Parents have more educational choices. And Superintendent Dr. Matt Smith needs only to look west toward Fort Worth to see what can happen when the state decides a school district is falling short.
A state takeover is sort of like having your mother-in-law decide your house is such a mess that she’s moving in, rearranging the furniture and telling everybody where they’ll sleep.
Except the mother-in-law has lawyers.
Smith has been Arlington’s superintendent since January 2024, arriving after nearly four years running Belton ISD.
The Convocation theme was “Making Dreams Happen,” and AISD did its best to make the morning and afternoon sessions feel like a cross between a pep rally, awards show and season opener.
There were choirs, orchestras and dancers. Students from across the district performed. Successful AISD graduates returned to remind us that, yes, public school works.
Community partners joined the celebration. Texas Trust Credit Union even gave six employees cruises for two.
I suppose nothing says “Welcome back to school” quite like “Here’s your chance to leave town.”
Fuller wasn’t there, so I gave her the highlights. I told her about the performances, the cheering and the effort to pump up enthusiasm for a profession that lately seems to be under siege from every direction.
That’s what I like about pep rallies. They usually happen before the game.
Nothing has happened yet. You haven’t won. But you haven’t lost, either.
There’s something wonderful about that moment. Everybody is undefeated. Even the kid who spent last season sitting at the end of the bench thinks this might finally be his year.
For Arlington ISD, this is that moment.
Smith has said his focus includes celebrating the district, embracing its strategic plan, building connections and strengthening community partnerships.
Those are good things.
They also sound a lot easier inside an arena filled with music and applause than they will in February when test scores arrive and budgets tighten.
That’s when “Making Dreams Happen” runs into the considerably less catchy business of making public education work.
Which brings us back to Fuller.
She doesn’t talk about strategic plans. She doesn’t study district organizational charts. She isn’t sitting around worrying about accountability ratings.
Fuller merely wants the people making decisions to remember that somewhere underneath the enrollment projections, test scores, budgets and acronyms are actual children.
That may be the biggest challenge facing Smith and AISD this year.
Not making dreams happen.
Making parents like Fuller believe they still can.
For now, she’s taking the same approach she uses when the cards aren’t quite what she hoped for.
She’ll play the hand.
“I’m just going to roll with it,” she said.
In public education these days, that may qualify as optimism.
