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The House Public Education Committee met to hear invited testimony on the Texas Education Agency’s implementation of House Bill 3 (School Finance, 86-R) and House Bill 22 (A-F Accountability, 85-R).

This report is intended to give you an overview and highlight of the discussions on the various topics the committee took up. It is not a verbatim transcript of the hearing but is based upon what was audible or understandable to the observer and the desire to get details out as quickly as possible with few errors or omissions.

 

Implementation of HB 22 (A-F Accountability, 85th R)

Mike Morath, Texas Education Agency Commissioner  

  • Transitioned design to 3 domains
  • Set up a D “needs improvement” rating
  • Notes “D sits in this weird” place as it can be both unacceptable and acceptable, statute has created a great deal of complexity in how they address
  • 2 different references to domain rating and “consecutive” language
  • Campus performance scenarios were provided. See Commissioner Morath’s slides.
  • If you execute an 1882 partnership, then the timeline can be paused – but core statute sets up a six year timeline for D’s
  • The proposed rule TEA was asked to pause on is trying to tackle 4 challenges. See Commissioner Morath’s slides.
  • Chairman Huberty – hearing perhaps the statute needs to be tightened up and cleaned up, what rules where you going to adopt?
    • To clarify what would take place next year
    • Problem with lack of clarity – no one is subject to intervention today over this but it becomes a problem next year
    • Law can be read a number of different ways
  • Rep. Dutton – does BOM relate to campus or district?
    • Campus
  • Commissioner’s Recommendations
    • Believes needs improvement should require some type of intervention
    • 1) Recommends removing all references to domain for “required” intervention
    • 2) Asked do you want commissioner hands to be tied after six years to close or order a BOM because of a campus D rating? – why not continue to count the years but only if it subsequently falls in the later years
  • Chairman Huberty – where are we at working with the school districts on this? thinks there are multiple issues including uncomplicating and wants to wait on the rule
    • Does not necessarily disagree, but law seems to require something to happen next year or something different next year
    • Problem with no being clear on what intervention requirements will be required next year
  • Rep. Allen – asked if Wheatley High School is caught up in this?
    • They have had an F so the D issue is not relevant
    • Whether we move forward with rulemaking or not, there are districts that this will be an issue for next year
    • Lack of clarity gives pause on how they build their action plans
    • Responds to Allen question on future years, would like to work on clarity
  • Lots of places in statute where “unacceptable” is referred to, need to look at how it is used in statute. See Commissioner Morath’s slides.
  • Local Accountability Update
    • State has access to certain information, but districts have access to more
    • Had 19 pilot districts that submitted pilot data for local accountability system
    • Ran into 3 big challenges
    • State had challenged TEA to be responsible for accountability which in some ways have eroded local/trustee role but on other side TEA has developed accountability muscle
    • Indicator needs to be reliable, viable, and have calibration
    • This takes a long time to build out
    • Chairman Huberty – 19 participated but just 2 are up? Who and why were others not approved?
      • Snyder and Dallas ISD
      • Alief and Humble example not being approved – came down to question on if data is reliable and viable
    • Chairman Huberty – Dallas ISD got approved, which is fine but what is it they did that others didn’t?
      • Comes down to reliability (consistent results each time), validity, calibration
      • Ex parents survey if online select in then just one demographic group
      • Ex recess holding fails surface level check if you just make sure you have it and not that it serves the function
      • Ex calibration – in calibration with broader A-F system
    • Chairman Huberty – reads off list of districts submitted (12), looking at Austin and Alief or Sunnyvale ISD, what did they not do correctly?
      • Provided specific guidance for every district
      • It took some responsiveness from the district to get approved
    • Rep. Talarico – asked for more details on process to approval
      • Discusses there were lessons learned from this process
      • Variety of things they have learned and will be far more supportive of districts on a go forward basis
      • Because A-F is emotionally charged, they want to go through this process with staff and many districts will not go down road if they get a lower score using own process
    • Rep. King and Commissioner Morath discuss other indicators such as character, extra-curricular, etc.
    • State accountability does not kick in until 3rd grade but there are ways to monitor
    • Rep. King – If Dallas or Snyder are only two that qualify how are other small rural districts going to get there
      • Agrees
    • Rep. King – can they see what was done specifically to check every box
      • Appendix is available but can also follow up with members on all the specifics in the plan
    • Rep. King – would like ongoing update as they progress on this system
    • Rep. Bernal – seems like some districts are further along than others, once a district is successful can that detail be made available
      • Both plans are shared with next cycle applicants
      • They have to have the data collection system in place
    • Rep. Bernal – do we know under their system if they would have done better or worse
      • Can send that information
    • Rep. Bernal – under Dallas ISD modified system they did a bit worse
      • Morath points out Dallas ISD graded the system more harshly
      • Bernal argues for a balance in the system
    • Next steps: Dec 1, 2022 is when TEA comes back to legislature on how to make it work
    • Chairman Huberty – why will it take 3 more years?
      • Piloting data collection – it takes decent administrative time to collect data on extracurricular for example, should not cost the system to much administrative resources
      • Like to collect data for a few years before they use it in accountability
    • Chairman Huberty and Commissioner Morath discuss ESSA amendment not yet submitted for how to address intervention requirements
    • Chairman Huberty – do you plan on adopting the D rule and what are your next steps?
      • Will reach out to the 13 districts that are affected and those districts that will be affected at the domain level and ask how they will react to lack of clarity
    • Rep. Allen – wants more detail on Wheatley High School.
    • Chairman Huberty – get back to members on how it goes with those 13 campuses and prior to adopting anything will check with Sen. Taylor. Preference would be to address statute during legislative year.
    • Rep. Talarico – will hear about A-F being primarily a measure of economics
      • 3 domains correlation is about .4 – not a strong correlation and not a non-existent correlation
      • Student achievement domain is correlated with poverty but school progress domain is correlated weekly
      • So overall correlation is a low moderate correlation
      • So have high poverty campuses getting high/strong results
      • Argues A-F measures management practice and support of staff
    • Rep. Talarico – hears concerns of system being demoralizing, etc if put an F on a campus, does it mean they are not making the right choices?
      • Thinks it is a disservice to talk about accountability in A-F without at same time talk about capacity
      • Agency needs to provide support and resources
      • Tiered system of accountability is helpful for change management system
      • Negativity addressed to school leaders is inappropriate
    • Rep. Dutton – in districts where students from poor neighborhoods go to high performing schools those students do as well in achievement, any evidence to support this thought
      • That a family that exercises choice does better?
      • School progress does have a poverty comparison inside of it
    • Rep. Dutton – argues what is suggested for the accountability system, electing to make changes to get where you want to be
      • Agrees this accountability system is a change management system, total quality management type of approach
    • Rep. Bernal – HB 3 in part recognized that more resources are needed for some students, but also hears Dutton saying that based on how we measure poverty that there are intervening factors that reveal themselves in the classroom, need to identify non-academic things impact academics
    • Rep. Bernal – thinks this is part of the Commissioner’s job to identify non-academic things impact academics, gives example of students not having health care and at a certain point need to identify

 

H.D. Chambers, Alief ISD and Texas School Alliance

  • Really tired of talking about accountability, does not oppose accountability but need it to a point where they can have meaningful conversations on how to improve it
  • They will talk about 1) reaction to proposed D-F rule, 2) disproportion in system showing poverty, and 3) local accountability
  • Regarding local accountability – seems to be they were denied, many indicators based on adult behaviors – how to change adult behaviors that would lead to better outputs, provides example of AVID
  • Believes if it was not based on student performance then would not be acceptable, they focused on changing adult behaviors (other ways to measure inputs)
  • Rep. King – asked to see plan, specifics on it?
    • Yes
  • Readability of assessments concern, has a few D campuses and working through improvement plans and wonders if we are getting a truly accurate reflection of student performance
    • STAAR only measurement in 3-8 grades – argues to please not lose sight of this issue of readability as they continue
    • Agrees with Bernal comment on non-academic issues impacting students, STAAR is being asked to do some things it cannot
  • Rep. Talarico – agrees with need for multiple measures, love idea of local accountability, question on input versus outputs and balance
    • In context of local accountability, must of outputs are already demonstrated so what are they doing to improve
    • There are some inputs that would need to be measured if they actually did something
    • Agrees need to be careful, but consideration needs to be given arguing an input may not be in a measurable test score
  • Rep. Meyer – asked about feelings on process of pilot of local accountability?
    • It is challenging to build the plane while flying it
    • There was miscommunication in one part where they thought something was acceptable and what was not
    • Would have been helpful to have conversation with clear responses on what is acceptable or not
  • Rep. Meyer asked for an example
    • Took no answer as it was ok if they were moving forward, or told to clarify versus it was acceptable or not
  • Rep. Dutton – Likes to A-F is a measurement of our system of education delivery, more of a picture of what we are doing versus they students

 

Dee Carney, Texas School Alliance

  • Two sets of proposed rules on D rating (one in July and one filed in September)
  • Agrees with committee asking to delay final ruling until legislature has opportunity to weight in
  • Propose rules would expand definition of unacceptable to D rating
  • Proposed rules impact hundreds of campuses
  • Differences between a D rating and F rating and by saying a D is really an F, creating more confusion
  • Support request to delay adopting of proposed rules until 87th
  • Chairman Huberty – has TSA been working with TEA, 13 districts need to work with in some form?
    • Several organizations will be happy to talk about what is needed now versus later
    • Have not had that conversation with TEA

 

Brian Woods, Northside ISD and TSA

  • Overall performance and socio-economic status
  • Illustrated trends of D-F grades going to districts with higher economic disadvantaged students
  • Of all variables that impact student achievement, 33% of overall model is determined by one variable alone
  • If purpose is to drive resources where it is needed most, argues labeling D or F may not do that
  • Spectrum weights (SES Tiers) could be applied to Domain 1 which is very highly correlated with economic status
  • Allow for local accountability to account for some portion of a grade that is given, STAAR test by itself cannot adequately address
  • Chairman Huberty – are you suggesting different weights on students?
    • Apply a difference in weights to Domain 1 to help equalize performance who are “at a different starting line”
  • Rep. Bernal – believes accountability drives behavior, regardless of feelings of STAAR don’t want to do something to accountability that allows adults to not pay attention and likes to some degree to cause deliberate anxiety on adults to do as much as they can
  • Rep. Bernal – if you are one of the weighted students, how do you ensure teachers try harder for those students? How do you make sure those kids get more resources and attention? If we removed A-F would we still be having this conversation?
    • Labels have consequences, if we agree accountability should drive resources where they are needed the most need to look at consequence of the label
    • Does label help or harm that?
    • Trying to encourage teachers to go work in areas further out and giving them a greater task and not sure a D-F label aids in that process
  • Rep. Bernal – using language to evaluate schools that children understand, that we would allow a student to brand themselves walking through an F school is damaging
  • Rep. Dutton – are districts evaluating how well they are doing and sending teachers to those with worst problem?
    • Need to do everything we can to encourage best to work with neediest
    • System is an evaluation of circumstances outside the schoolhouse
  • Rep. Dutton – having grown up in a segregated campus, wants to know how lack of money became indicative of education and does not recall that was the way it was when he went to school
    • Agrees geography should not play a role but data indicates it does
  • Chambers – The current way Texas uses accountability is not capable of doing all we want it to do. There needs to be more than a standardized test
  • Rep. Bernal – If we know that kids from wealthy families are doing fine, why not remove that factor? Adjust there and let the focus be low income

 

Greg Smith, Clear Creek ISD and TSA

  • One of the 19 pilot districts for the Local Accountability System, opted out in Feb. 2019
  • Complications from interpret statute to where we are today is a great divide
  • Significant staff time needed was not worth it to be in local accountability
  • Concerns district grade cannot be an A if a campus gets a D, A is now a B and D is now an F is impracticable
  • Chairman Huberty – specifically talking about a Domain as a D so B is best grade a district can get, how do you reconcile?
    • Instead of avg all domains, look at each grade in each domain instead an overall mixture
    • (members in background talk about bill last session that addressed this)
  • Chairman Huberty – wants to clean up these issues, getting grade they deserve then great but gets they have work to do

 

Implementation of HB 3 (86th R)

Mike Morath, Texas Education Agency Commissioner  

  • Express gratitude for bill
  • Provides high level overview – supports teaching profession, addresses equity, reforms to drive how we teach and support, cut everyone’s property taxes
  • Agency has website dedicated to HB 3, HB 3 in 30 video series, created resources to help discuss details
  • Works to communicate as aggressively as possible on details on the bill
  • 5 more HB 3 in 30 videos to go, has made 20 so far
  • Takes 6 months of detailed discussions to talk about what the bill does
  • 50ish rules relating to HB 3 – some were needed no matter what, many are new for HB 3
  • Chairman Huberty – do you have data on pay raise yet?
    • Planning to do a data collection, technically TEA is not required as districts were required to report to Legislature directly, however, TEA is collecting data on this and will start around January
  • Several advisory committees were created as a result of the bill and all are in the process of being stood up currently
  • Unintended consequences authority, Commissioner can if approved by LBB unilaterally change something in formulas and has sought this in four areas: 1) exempt one-time formula transition grant money from that calculation of the 30% pay raise, 2) -4) discussed in testimony and handouts
  • Chairman Huberty – charter special education question
    • Specific to charters, they will not see special education funding go down
  • Rep. Ashby – CTE midsize allotment, any update
    • Even though they get more money in CTE they will lose funding in midsize allotment and believes this is essence of unintended consequence and believes they have a temporary internal fix
  • Chairman Huberty – believes it was not intended that CTE would reduce district funding
    • Districts on avg. gain funding, not a situation where districts are losing money but there are a few exceptions (approx. 20 districts)
    • Don’t want districts to remove student from CTE
    • Larger problem is interplay between CTE and small to midsize adjustment
    • Fix would change the incentives
  • Rep. VanDeaver – this problem sounds similar to one dealing with open enrollment charters, funding is up overall but not for program
    • Fix is somewhat analogous, fix will not have a fiscal note
  • Rep. Talarico – asked about Fast Growth Allotment, cut off point for small districts
    • Legislation did not consider a bifurcated model, and to address would be inconsistent with the model runs
    • Hear looking at strict percentage growth vs cost growth – something worthy of legislative deliberation and looking at it to see if it would merit unintended consequences decision
  • Chairman Huberty – Klein added 2k kids because of Harvey
    • Version that would cost about $20 million and add a few districts
    • Statute is based on estimate of enrollment
    • Deciding between what is unintended consequence for him to address in interim versus legislature to address when they are back in session
  • Rep. Talarico – regarding Fast Growth, it was intended
    • The models intended it, but it may be unintended result
  • HB 3 offshoot HB 3906 on testing – move towards online testing, and study required to study readability levels, etc
    • Study results delivered Dec 1 and Feb 1
  • Chairman Huberty – CCMR tools on tracking and resources for advising
    • Working in partnership with UT Austin with onCourse
    • In process but working on this
  • Rep. Talarico – question on outcomes bonus in CCMR and cut points
    • Statute says legislature will fund, bonus at 25% percentile
    • 25% percentile for SPED is 0 so for every special education student that graduates CCMR school will get a $2k bonus
  • Rep. Talarico – funding will be based on 17-18
    • Data on outcome is lagging, function of how long it takes to round up data
    • Talarico and Morath talk about industry based certificates and need to still pass TSI
  • Rep. Bell – how many days are needed to be enrolled in college
    • THECB uses 12 day
    • Student will need to have earned associate degree or still be enrolled
  • Rep. Talarico – asked if there is an update on military readiness data
    • Data shows that Texas has doubled number of enlistments, but it is self-reported data so working with Department of Defense
  • Chairman Huberty – working on masters with higher ed institution?
    • Yes
  • Chairman Huberty – reimbursements for Harvey
    • Heard it was total of $500k, $121k in a particular district so will follow up with him separately on this item
  • Chairman Huberty – update on dyslexia
    • First batch of identification won’t come in until Fall PEIMS but may not have until next September
    • Special Education evaluations are up 56% in last three years
  • Rep. Bernal – intent behind McKinney Vento would get highest weight, teacher program was in part about getting them to go to hardest campuses so how will they identify?
    • Will have a website of different tiers so highest dollar value is $32k in extra incentive funding
  • Rep. Bernal – started to get calls from parents from districts who are going to take a pass on full day pre-K?
    • There is a waiver/transition period and will support districts as they ramp up
    • Waiver is contingent on them seeking partnership with private partnerships
  • Rep. Talarico – concerns on special ed students not passing TSI for CCMR and CTE programs
    • Don’t have a good answer for first question, will fall under multiple teams at TEA
    • To soon to tell how districts will respond to CTE availability in 7th grade
  • Chairman Huberty – mentioned his concern on Fast Growth Allotment and want to get an update on it

 

Implementation of HB 3 (86th R) – Panel 2

Marshall Harrison, Sunray ISD, Texas Association of Rural Schools

  • State Accountability is not a true measure of what happens to student when they leave the district, HB 3 attempts that in CCMR
  • Looked at HB 3 and asked about to capitalize it to increase funding, majority of kids in rural Texas are bouncing around from job to job and HB 3 makes district accountable for kids
  • If you look at Sunray ISD, ISD is losing about $23k, working to maintain teachers and difficult to balance budget
  • Needs to be a concentrated effort to educate boards and superintendents on HB 3; some could be caught by surprise due to the 7-month lag between appraised values and bringing in new revenue
  • Appraised values in July, so nearly 7 months in budget before getting in revenue
  • Looking at P20, earlier adopter and can get $2 million more in charter funding if they get that designation
  • Chairman Huberty – thinks Commissioner agrees there is a problem on CTE/mid-size
  • Talarico – commends them for adopting P20, Commit is working on professional development, hopefully some non-governmental groups will be helping as well
  • CTE funding issue affects districts at 800 and below
  • Chairman Huberty – Commissioner does agree that this is a problem, so would expect that this issue is resolved soon

 

Lonnie Hollingsworth, Texas Classroom Teachers Association

  • Appreciates the 20% increase in the minimum salary schedule, raised the floor significantly & will raise salaries overall over time
  • Reviews bilingual, CCMR CTE funding weights – argues some compensation plans are too low and cautions districts are waiting until next year to address
  • Compensation increases via the Dynamic Teacher Salary Increases are a really good idea, only concern is that district treat it as a ceiling rather than a floor; have seen problems with districts trying to hit the minimum requirement
  • Problem is districts don’t have the data, basically have to guess as to what funding will be, moving parts of HB 3 complicate this
  • Has been some lack of clarity on how things like how Early Education Allotment works and how it stacks, districts don’t realize this and it is taking time to plug values into budgeting
  • Some districts have been too low in trying to hit budget numbers when the compensation numbers came out in July, many assuming statute requires good faith effort, but it requires compliance
  • Chairman Huberty – How many districts are doing this?
    • Have one grievance right now
    • Also have seen districts have issues with transition funding, some assume large amounts when it will be not much at all
    • Commissioner has authority to adjust funding entitlements, unsure that Commissioner has ability to dictate how these are spent
  • TEA has told some that they may not be able to adjust salaries later in the year and make it retroactively applicable; Hollingsworth thinks this is Constitutional, but state should clarify if this is not the intent
  • Have heard discussion of format for financial summaries from TEA, but districts don’t use this to set budgets, use 3rd party
  • Would ask that it is made clear to districts that they are to comply with salary provisions this year and that they are to do this without running afoul of the Constitution

 

Nicole Conley, Austin ISD

  • HB 3 allowed Austin ISD to provide raises for all employees/teachers, reduced operating budget from $30m to $3m deficit; have been able to somewhat stabilize the budget, though can’t avoid closing schools due to funding
  • Results of implementation of HB 3 indicates there will be more compliance rules than before
  • TEA HB 3 resource is very good, but budgets have already been approved and Austin ISD is trying to play catch-up, reporting has also changed and is requiring work to understand
  • Speaking to CCMR, fear is tying money to performance & outcomes can sometimes affect the most vulnerable groups of students, can destabilize funds for services
  • Have kept CCMR programs in place despite changes in HB 3, but there can be a misalignment between current need and available resources under an outcomes-based funding system
  • Need a mechanism to ensure program stability, lack of predictability can impact
  • Reliance on standardized test and passing scores for CCMR could undermine equity
  • Special Education bonus should be increases, thresholds should be looked at closely under an outcomes-based funding system as costs of supporting students are substantially more than initial program requirements assume
  • Standardized tests can induce stigma if student fails
  • Should look at decoupling passage of tests and requirement to be accepted into college, enlist, etc. in CCMR; recommends making it an “or”
  • Military enlistment should be looked at, perhaps should count if students enroll in JROTC, etc.
  • Chairman Huberty – This is kind of the point of it isn’t it?
    • Would like to see either/or, would like to see investments districts put into JROTC be counted as well, can’t control if a student actually enlists
  • PEIMS requires lots of data to be submitted to TEA, HB 3 has added significantly to this and requires resources to implement, collect, and submit
  • Discussion on adding SEL to Comp Ed
  • Rep. Bernal – So you’re talking about professional development?
    • Professional development, but also student development; does have an ancillary benefit to non-Eco-Dis
  • Rep. Talarico – Defining what you mean by SEL is important, so in-class material that teaches these skills, mindfulness room?
    • Yes
  • Rep. Talarico – Why is this important to include in Comp Ed
    • Many students do not have this material available elsewhere, lack of support; creating culture of inclusivity
    • Should be able to qualify SEL under the spending categories as Eco-Dis kids benefit most, ancillary benefits to all other students
  • Like the tiered funding in Comp Ed, would like to see homeless and foster care counted in the highest tier
  • Changes in Comp Ed allows use of census data, question remains over whether income verification forms are necessary
  • TEA has indicated incremental salaries are able to be used for bilingual
  • In terms of the Extended Year Program, initial TEA guidance suggested you needed 180 instructional days, but this is inconsistent with legislative language regarding minutes of instruction; many districts will have difficulty with this
  • Rep. King – Question to TEA Is that 180 days right? Mentions that TEA will be called back to respond
  • Rep. Bernal – Austin ISD gave 6% raises?
    • 6% for all staff, 7% for more senior teachers
  • Rep. Bernal – I know some districts gave only 3% raises due to concerns with sustainability of HB 3, but you ran towards this; tell me about how you determined this number
    • Austin has a competitive wage gap for teachers, always set paying teachers as #1 spending priority; knew that we wanted to spend the bulk of it on teachers
    • Austin ISD knew it wanted to spend at least 60% of allotment on salaries, which is why the small deficit still exists

 

Elizabeth Fagen, Humble ISD

  • Districts have been putting together budgets pretty hastily due to the timeline
  • Challenges of implementation are related to the timeline
  • Early Childhood piece, full day Pre-K is funded at .5, but already had full-day Pre-K which makes it supplanting and puts Humble ISD behind on Comp Ed
  • Expected to be able to backfill some of the costs with funding from HB 3, but now finding out that this is considered supplanting by TEA
  • On Incentive Pay, Humble ISD is studying this currently; concerned that this was really considered a local decision before, but portability eliminates opportunity to make this a local decision as it moves with the teacher
  • Conversation around nationally board-certified teachers being automatically recognized, some districts say they will not do this as it affects the culture & impacts some of the compensation for these teachers; unsure about this being an automatic “yes”
  • Performance pay is difficult as it creates a large number of appeals and creates a different culture; concerned about the timeline
  • Had questions about the Extended Year Piece regarding minutes vs. days, would like more flexibility on how to do this, there is a difference in how teachers and students are counted & .5 funding for this is a challenge
  • Chairman Huberty – So you’re saying we only funded the teachers?
    • Half of the teachers
  • Humble ISD gives all students the PSAT at 8th grade & wanted to use this as a local accountability measure, but breakdown in conversation came at cut scores; 42% of TX 8th graders take PSAT and likely higher performing 8th graders, TEA stated average score in that 42% is around a C and feels like they have to prove the cut score piece
  • Humble ISD wanted to support students taking Pre-AP courses in middle school, but Commissioner felt like Humble would have to prove that a Pre-AP English course in one middle school is the same as another using intercourse assessments, but Humble does not want any more assessments, colleges are not comparing one class to another in this way
  • Humble ISD is trying to build the local accountability piece, but can’t agree with the parameters
  • Chairman Huberty – Are you going back and doing that again?
    • Wanted to pause on this piece, in process for building local assessments and wanting to share & use
    • Will create a local accountability system in Humble ISD and share with TEA to see if it is acceptable, but if not this is okay and will continue to implement
  • Chairman Huberty – Have you seen an uptake in identification of dyslexia students?
    • Yes, in special education and dyslexia
  • Chairman Huberty – In full day Pre-K, thought we had earmarked money regardless of whether you are paying for it already; are you hearing from TEA that this is not allowable?
    • Hearing that we cannot use Comp Ed to pay for half of Pre-K as this would be supplanting
  • Chairman Huberty – Will take a look at that
  • Chairman Huberty – Is there another metric aside from board-certified teachers?
    • Haven’t worked on this at all, challenge due to the timeline of this
    • Hollingsworth, TCTA – Haven’t taken a position on the portability, but kind of like it as teachers can use this for bargaining power
  • Rep. VanDeaver – have you seen an uptick in teachers working through the board certification process?
    • Fagen, Humble ISD – No, very new

 

Guy Sconzo, Fast Growth School Coalition

  • HB 3 has more positive effect on the state than anything prior
  • Have a concern in choosing to identify top quartile of fast growth districts in the state based on percentage of enrollment growth over the preceding 3 years, you have districts growing by very low numbers of students being eligible
  • Advocate calculating this based on absolute growth, would mean the low end of the top quartile would include those districts growing by 40 students
  • Chairman Huberty – I think we’ve found that with districts like Klein who were not eligible despite large number of students; will take a look at the proposed language, thinks this needs to be statutory change
    • Language is suggested changes for rules
    • Fully understand there is a difference in cost, but absolute was the target we were trying to hit
  • Rep. Talarico – When you have districts growing like Pflugerville saying that the allotment is not benefiting them, then it is not working as intended
  • Chairman Huberty – Appreciates districts in the panel implementing teacher pay raises
  • Chairman Huberty – Understands the issue with CT, fought very hard to get it down to 7th grade
  • Rep. M. Gonzalez – One of my districts gave an 8% pay raise, but was still seeing turnover, have the raises helped with turnover?
    • Fagen, Humble ISD – Turnover was about the same currently, but not sure it has had opportunity to work on this due to timing
    • Marhsall, Sunray ISD – Salary helps, but also has to do with benefits outside the salary; also a morale issue and making sure teachers want to stay there
  • Rep. M. Gonzalez – It’s not a silver bullet then
    • Hollingsworth, TCTA – Teachers must resign prior to a certain date, fell before the salary raises being implemented
    • Conley, Austin ISD – Experiencing a teacher shortage

 

Von Byer, TEA

  • Chairman Huberty – Dr. Fagen spoke to the supplanting of funds, intention was that if you were already paying for full day Pre-K
    • Early Education Allotment was allowed to be spent on reading & math for Pre-K to 3rd grade, under Comp Ed 55% of funds must be used to fund supplemental services and program
    • Pre-K is a requirement and thus not a supplemental service anymore, but only 55% of Comp Ed funds are subject to this
    • Would like to have a chance to go back and see what was said, by I think this is the source
  • Chairman Huberty – I know 55% was very important to Sen. West, wanted to have some sort of defined percentage
    • Prior to this, many districts wanted to use Comp Ed to fund teachers or other things, wasn’t allowed as the fear was that it was supplanting Basic Allotment funds
    • If issue is identified and district fails to correct
  • Regarding the 180-day instructional day requirement; in order for districts to qualify they must provide instruction for the specified 75,600 minutes and at least 180 days; believes this language is very clear and designed to end the Summer slide, would need to revisit the language next Session
  • Chairman Huberty – Some schools are moving to 4-day school weeks
    • It was made clear that districts could provide the required minutes in less than 180 days, but then the district would lose access to the extra incentive
    • 30 additional half days are provided for @$25/student, thought was that half of this would be spent on teachers to provide this and the other half on school operation costs
    • TEA has walked through several examples in HB 3 in 30 video series
  • Chairman Huberty – Conley spoke to PEIMS requirements, does TEA have intention of providing more flexibility as we move forward?
    • Unsure on what districts would like the leniency on, but Commissioner intends to help people implement, not help people avoid
    • With respect to Comp Ed being 55%, TEA already has a historical practice that if a district misses it for a year it needs to make it up the following year, so long as no fraud is involved
  • Rep. VanDeaver – So if a district made a good faith effort but missed the target, they still receive a mark on the audit, correct?
    • Believe TEA would like to see multiple years of this before it affects the audit, but can look into this and get back to you
    • Some failures are immediately detrimental to the audit and some are not, believe that this situation is not an automatic failure, but could lead to this if there are other issues

 

Closing Comments

  • Chairman Huberty – Not planning on having another meeting this year unless we see something we do not like.

 

Watch the recording of the House Public Education Committee meeting here:

https://tlchouse.granicus.com/MediaPlayer.php?view_id=44&clip_id=18247