Lynn Boswell, Austin ISD Trustee, District 5

09/11/2026

All are invited to the Day of Dance tomorrow. It’s free, fun, and open to all! Join MINDPOP and Austin ISD Fine Arts to celebrate the joy of movement and connection to community!

We are so excited to partner with Austin ISD Fine Arts and Creative Learning Initiative at Austin ISD to host the first annual Day of Dance!

This free, family-friendly event celebrates our shared language of movement through a full day of free dance performances, workshops & classes, photographers, and more.

RSVPs are encouraged but not required to attend: https://austinisdpac.ludus.com/index.php

06/21/2026

If you're looking for fun, family-friendly (and often also free!) summer activities, MINDPOP has a resource for you! This guide is filled with ideas and experiences for kids and adults, too!

At MINDPOP, we believe you have the power to create something truly amazing! Whether you're excited by drawing, dancing, music or writing, there's something here to spark your imagination.

05/26/2026

How much do I love this? SO, SO much!

San Antonio Spurs player Victor Wembanyama is sharing a reading list of his favorite books - and we have discovered that he nerds out with lots of sci-fi and fantasy. That's him in front of the main San Antonio Public Library in my hometown - in a shade that is officially called Enchilada Orange. (I ❤️ Austin. And I still 🧡 San Antonio, too!) And San Antonio has responded by reserving a ton of the books on his list - just in time for summer reading!

So Austin, who would we want to see share a list of favorite books for the Austin Public Library?

READ LIKE WEMBY 📚 Victor Wembanyama is known for his dominance on the court, but off the hardwood, the Spurs star is gaining attention for another passion: reading. https://bit.ly/4tDsTD8
The San Antonio Central Library is spotlighting that lesser-known side of Wembanyama with a new “Read Like Wemby” display

05/23/2026

The Texas primary runoff is on Tuesday. And the ballot includes some important races for positions that impact our state's public schools.

Raise Your Hand Texas explains who makes decisions about school funding in Texas. And Travis County Clerk has details about when and where to vote.https://votetravis.gov/wp-content/uploads/PR26-ED-Sites-Flyer-FINAL.pdf

It's quick! It's easy! And it matters!

Early voting continues through Friday, May 22. The leaders who will shape education policy will be determined by who shows up at the polls, so make your plan to vote today.

04/06/2026

I love knowing that one of the people leading the NASA Artemis mission is an Austin ISD graduate! And I love that the foundation she built in our community’s public schools are part of the foundation for her success, and the mission’s success.

There are so many great reasons to choose public school. And this Austin ISD graduate shows us that the sky’s NOT the limit for what our graduates can accomplish!

“I just got one of the best educations that money could buy out of a public school district,” Nelson said. “I count myself really lucky and super grateful to all those teachers I benefited from in Austin.”

Thank you to Keri Heath and Austin American-Statesman for you reporting on this local angle to a story about humans traveling farther than ever before!

NASA's chief flight director, Emily Nelson, is an Austin ISD and UT graduate. She leads the team overseeing human space flight during the Artemis II mission. https://www.statesman.com/news/education/article/artemis-ii-nasa-emily-nelson-flight-director-22186639.php?utm_campaign=trueanthem&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook

04/03/2026

I'm so excited about the new fields coming to Austin High and every other Austin ISD high school. These are wonderful new resources for our students, and exciting new spaces for creating connections within our Austin ISD family and our community.

04/03/2026

This longtime tool from Texas Tribune just got a major makeover, and I'm so excited about it! The new and improved Schools Explorer tool - presented by Raise Your Hand Texas - uses data to help families and communities understand Texas public schools with more depth, nuance, and breadth. This is your way to look beyond A-F ratings, beyond STAAR scores, and beyond the headlines to develop a deeper understanding about who students are, how schools are funded and how districts are using that funding, what class size and teacher experience look like, and so much more. You can explore by district or by campus. And you will learn a ton!

Thank you to all who have created and supported this powerful new resource, and to all who will use it to better understand public education in your community and across our state.

Today, we are unveiling our most ambitious update yet to The Texas Tribune’s schools explorer, with more information and added context to help Texans interpret information about our schools.

02/17/2026

Nine minutes, fifty-four seconds. That's how long it took me to vote this morning in the Texas primary election - from the moment I walked into the building to the moment I walked out.

Early voting starts today across the state. And primary elections matter. It's our opportunity to choose who will represent us on the ballot in November. And this year's primary includes some very important races, from the US Senate, Governor, Lt. Governor, and Attorney General at the top of the ballot, to state representatives and Texas State Board of Education reps in the middle, to county party chair near the bottom.

Turnout in primaries is always far lower than it is in the general election. So your vote carries extra weight. Here's what you need to know:
1. Early voting starts today and ends on February 27. The primary Election Day is March 3.
2. You can find polling places at https://votetravis.gov
3. Endorsements, candidates' websites, and other resources make it easy to do your homework.
4. Please vote all the way down the ballot. Every race matters.

Voting is easy. It's quick. And it matters.

02/09/2026

Registration is open for the Austin Parks Foundation It's My Park Day - a fun city-wide extravaganza of community projects in schoolyards and parks throughout Austin. The event is on March 7, and you can choose to volunteer with a huge range of projects - including many at Austin ISD campuses. To find a project and sign up, go to https://www.givepulse.com/group/9012-Its-My-Park-Day-Spring You will meet new people, make a difference, have tons of fun, AND get a very cute It's My Park Day T-shirt!

02/09/2026

Every single staff member in Austin ISD is part of the great work that happens for every single student in our district. I love seeing Trassell Underwood with Education Austin highlighted by Texas AFT. And I love that Trassell is using that recognition to highlight the life-changing work of our classified staff and the relationships they build with our students.

In this week's PSRP (Paraprofessionals & School-Related Personnel) AFT Newsletter, our very own Trasell Underwood was featured!

Trasell Underwood is a PSRP leader in Austin, Texas. Her parents were union activists, and her favorite movie growing up was Norma Rae, but she didn’t really think that she was organizing in her first education jobs. Early in her career, she worked at a private school with no union. Because she wasn’t afraid to speak up, her colleagues informally nominated her to lead a push to secure back pay owed for weekend and overtime work.

On her first day in the Austin Independent School District, she heard there was a union rep in the lounge, and she immediately went over to sign a card. As a classified staff member, Trasell wanted to build unity and solidarity across job classes. When she became an elected officer, one of her first priorities was working with the transportation workers to get back their bidding system for routes, so that assignments were not decided by favoritism. She immediately got to work gathering more than 400 signatures on a grievance that enabled a quick resolution to this issue.

From there, Trasell and the transportation workers have fought to ensure that laws for school safety apply to buses and that transportation staff have a seat at the table when district policies affecting them are created. Their work has expanded into many more issues that strengthened Austin schools and the students they serve.

February is Love the Bus Month, and when asked what she wished people knew about transportation workers—her favorite school staff member as a child was her bus driver—she said, “Bus drivers and monitors are the first and last set of teachers our kids see in the day. They are in the community, and they know the students and families. Bus drivers could do a lot of other jobs, but they choose to safely drive our kids to school and back every day.”

Trasell spoke about how transportation workers in Austin public schools have built a strong, united group across their three locations and job classifications; they trust and believe in their collective power. She said that when she began organizing with them, the most important thing was to “build that bridge between them and give them the confidence that they had a voice.”

She added that this philosophy guides her work as a classified leader: “We are not going to be treated like we are invisible. We will have a voice and be a part of the decisions that impact us.”