Local media personality and government transparency advocate Alex Stein announced Wednesday that he is running for a seat on Highland Park Independent School District’s (HPISD) Board of Trustees.
Stein personally picked up his candidacy application at the HPISD Administration Annex and filed to run for Place 7, one of the two board seats up for grabs on May 6. Per his filing, he will appear as “Prime Time #99 Alex Stein” on the ballot.
“Highland Park Independent School District, when Prime Time 99 wins, the whole game is going to change,” said Stein, recording himself picking up the necessary paperwork.
Given Stein’s penchant for public antics, The Dallas Express asked him if his bid for HPISD school board was serious or just another publicity stunt.
“My campaign is incredibly serious, but at the same time, I’m not going to take any donations, or spend any money whatsoever on this campaign, and strictly rely on free media exposure,” he said.
As far as his top priorities are concerned, if he were to win his election, Stein said that he wanted to ensure that HPISD students were not being “sexualized” at school.
“We must separate school and sex,” he said.
He also stated that he wants to help turn around the student body’s standardized test scores, which he called “garbage.”
“They have fallen significantly since the years that I graduated,” he said.
According to the Texas Education Agency (TEA), which compiles standardized testing data for the state, only 82% of students at HPISD scored at grade level on their STAAR exams last year.
Still, HPISD’s student achievement metrics for the 2021-2022 academic year far outperformed Dallas Independent School District (DISD), which saw only 41% of its students score at grade level on their STAAR exams.
Additionally, nearly 20% of DISD’s Class of 2022 failed to graduate on time, while HPISD’s Class of 2022 clocked a 99.3% on-time graduation rate.
“I also want to help children learn about actual applicable skills for their young adult lives and develop a curriculum that best sets them up for a successful future,” Stein said.
HPISD is not the first institution that the local advocate has sought to shake up.
As previously reported in The Dallas Express, Stein has made waves at meetings of both the Dallas City Council and the Dallas County Commissioners Court, often provoking the ire of officials.
In May 2022, he was forcibly removed from a commissioners court meeting after using the public comment component of the meeting to confront Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins about allegations made against him back when he was in college at Baylor University.
Stein has since sued, alleging that the commissioners court violated the Texas Open Meetings Act and suppressed his free speech.
Stein may have also made himself a target at Dallas City Council meetings, having possibly prompted a complete reconsideration of city rules and regulations that allow members of the public to address the city council in person, almost single-handedly.
Asked by The Dallas Express what he personally could bring to the table at HPISD, Stein responded:
“I have a unique set of skills that will be able to help bring attention to the needs of the district, and my unorthodox problem-solving skills will be a new wrinkle in the often times 100% agreeable board of trustees.”
