Morath was born in 1977[1] and was raised, for a time, in a coal mining town close to Western Virginia.
[2] He graduated from George Washington with a degree in business administration, completing his bachelor's in two-and-a-half years.
[6][7] As a trustee in 2013, Morath advocated allowing the district to the funnel savings gained from a proposed voluntary accelerated three-year graduation plan for high school students to keep full-day pre-kindergarten programs funded.
The programs were facing a return to a half-day schedule as a result of a 2011 state legislation that cut a combined $200 million from the school's budget.
[2] In November 2015, Governor Greg Abbott named Morath the presiding officer on the new Texas Commission on Next Generation Assessments and Accountability.
In February 2016, he appointed Judy Castleberry as conservator of the South San Antonio independent school District.
[16] In March, following an investigation by the agency, Morath appointed Sharon Doughty as conservator of the Edgewood independent school District in San Antonio.
[21] Low performance in one of over 200 schools in HISD also resulted in Morath deciding to pursue appointing a board of managers, one of the options allowed under state law, despite the district's relatively high B rating.
[24][25] In early 2016, following a glitch that erased the answers students inputted as part of a computerized state assessment test, Morath warned that the agency could reconsider its contract with the company, Educational Testing Service (ETS), which administers the State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness (STAAR).
[26] Calling the error "unacceptable,"[27] Morath announced his agency will impose a $20.7 million fine on ETS.