Stafford Municipal School District is a school district based in Stafford, Texas, United States in Greater Houston. The district covers all of the city of Stafford and is controlled by the city, making it the only school district in Texas that is not an independent school districtoperated by an independent school board. There are five schools on the campus of Stafford Municipal School District. The Primary/Elementary School building houses grades Pre-K through 4, the Intermediate School building houses grades 5 through 6, and the Middle/High School building houses grades 7 through 12. The administration building and athletic facilities are on the same campus as the school buildings. As of the beginning of the new 2019-2020 school year, a new building is being built. The purpose of the building is unknown, but some people think that this new building will be a 5-7 grades. The building will also have 3 layers. That would mean that the other schools, for example the intermediate might have another use other than 5-6 grades. The Stafford MSD area is served by the Houston Community College System. In 2018, the school district was rated an overall B by the Texas Education Agency.
History
In 1977, Stafford schools broke away from the Fort Bend Independent School District, which caused several rounds of federal litigation and by 1981 it was finally declared that the Stafford Municipal School District was constitutional. Almost all of Stafford was in the Fort Bend District, with a minuscule portion in the Houston Independent School District. All of Stafford is now zoned to the Stafford Municipal School District, which is the only school district in all of Texas that is controlled by a city.
Politics and geography
While Stafford MSD is a part of the City of Stafford and took all of the land in the city in 1977 when it was created, Stafford MSD cannot annex any territory without the consent of the other school districts which own that territory. Because of this, the City of Stafford, for a period of over 20 years ending in 2006, did not annex any territory in its extraterritorial jurisdiction as that would mean portions of its territory would fall within these independent school districts: Alief, Ft. Bend, and Houston. The city government of Stafford wants its school district's territory to be the same as its city limits.
*In 2011 a Mandarin Chinese and Vietnamese immersion program began at the primary school. As of May 2012 it has about 80 students in Kindergarten and grade 1. About half are native English speakers and half are native Mandarin and Vietnamese speakers.
Athletics
In 2014 the district was considering whether it should install artificial turf in its sports fields. At the time it had residual funds from a $49.9 million bond passed in 2011. As of 2016 the school district has had artificial turf inside its stadium.
