Judge blocks release of state's annual school ratings

A Travis County judge temporarily blocked the Texas Education Agency from releasing this year's annual school ratings after finding that the state’s new rating system–which was to debut this fall–is unlawful and would harm districts across the state.

The ruling issued Thursday evening comes after dozens of school districts across the state sued the TEA to delay the ratings, claiming the state's new school evaluation methodology would result in unfair drops in their ratings.

The agency had already postponed a planned September release of the ratings until sometime before the end of the year because it needed more time to adjust scores under the new system.