City leaders must unite to help troubled Houston Independent School District.

Houstonians must join together to support a school district with major challenges.

Something has changed in Texas public schools.

For decades, the Lone Star State’s education system could rely on bipartisan support, not to mention healthy bolstering from the oil-fueled Permanent School Fund. But when Pulitzerprize winning author Lawrence Wright was in Houston last week to speak about his new book, “God Save Texas,” he couldn’t help but point out that public education has suffered from a dearth of investment that’s distinctly, well, “un-Texan.”

The state’s current ranking in per pupil spending for education funding ranks 40th or lower by some measures, and the national ratings for reading levels for both 4th and 8th graders are even worse.

With this sort of pessimism at the top, and a threat of state takeover for the Houston Independent School District, it can be tempting to simply give up. But Texans don’t give in when the going gets tough. Now more than ever, Houstonians need to rally behind our schools.

Parents have demonstrated an impressive passion for and patience with HISD. Many families waited more than two hours as board members convened in executive session during the nowinfamous HISD meeting that resulted in arrests and community members booted from the district administration building. Parents will have to keep up that engagement and advocacy if HISD is to rescue its improvement-required campuses and remain a viable option for all Houston children.

The HISD board needs to start working hand-in-hand with these parents. That means transparency in its plans, listening to parents and students — even if they go over their allotted time during public comments — and putting an end to internal squabbling. This week, Houston ISD Trustee Elizabeth Santos called for school board President Rhonda Skillern-Jones to step down in light of last month’s heated board meeting. Parents and students deserve an apology from Skillern-Jones, but trustees must act as a cohesive board of governors. That means avoiding public spats.

The business and nonprofit community also has an opportunity to help provide guidance and resources. Already, groups such as Leadership ISD, Houstonians for Great Public Schools and Right Reason all engage with our public schools to empower good teachers, help needy students and push HISD in the right direction.

This business expertise would be most helpful in overseeing a muchneeded audit of HISD. It’s beyond careless that HISD can’t prove to naysayers that it is an efficient steward of tax dollars. No outsider has been hired to take a good look at HISD’s books for over a decade. The board is expected to vote this Thursday on authorizing a wideranging performance audit.

Things aren’t better up in Austin. It’s unbelievable in 2018 that the Texas Legislature doesn’t even know how much it costs to properly educate its students. Meanwhile, state stewardship of education dollars operates with a perverse logic. For the past decade, the Legislature shortchanged public schools while lavishly paying private contractors for tests to show they are failing. Then, in 2015, the Legislature threatened struggling schools with state takeover without providing additional resources.

Now, Houstonians are living with the divisive results, parents pitted against parents, and schools battling for survival.

On Tuesday, Mayor Sylvester Turner proposed that the city partner with businesses and philanthropic groups to create a nonprofit that would work with Houston ISD to turn around its failing schools. Although the Texas Education Agency said that such a partnership is not allowed under existing law, Turner’s proposal should serve as a call to action to the business community, the nonprofit community, parents and teachers that the district can’t be sloughed off onto the state as its problem to solve.

It would be an easy way out of this mess if Mike Morath, commissioner of TEA, had the manpower and the resources to rescue our kids while Houstonians applaud from the sidelines. But the results of TEA’s previous state takeovers have been mixed.

Houstonians must step up and engage in the conversation about how funding, accountability and governance are affecting students. We must stop settling for the status quo and demand a group of leaders — whether elected or appointed — who will put kids first.

Now is the time for all good Texans to come to the aid of their schools.