Proposals Fall Short

AT MID-SESSION, TEXAS LEGISLATURE AIMS AT — AND MISSES — TEACHER SHORTAGE SOLUTIONS

Mid-session is a time when things at the Capitol can — and do — change dramatically.

Throughout April, committee meetings are in full swing, and our lobby team is pulled in every direction. In the week this was written, about 80 of the bills we are following were scheduled for a hearing.

For each scheduled bill, the team summarizes, discusses and determines a position. If we have suggestions for improvement (which is often) we contact the bill sponsor to see if they will consider a committee substitute or amendment. Beyond committee hearings, TCTA is in frequent meetings with legislative offices, sometimes with other groups, to work out details of other bills. Now that the House and Senate are also considering bills on the floor, we are often working on floor amendments and providing other information to legislators.

This is a time of action and change, so a magazine article that is in your hands two weeks after it is written can’t focus on details. For that, we highly recommend our daily Capitol Updates (tcta.org/capitol-updates) and our weekly summation of Capitol goings-on and other news, the eUpdate newsletter (tcta.org/eupdate).

But here are some insights into how lawmakers are addressing this session’s most important education topic…

The teacher shortage

Two factors contributing to the teacher shortage are abundantly clear: Overall, salaries are inadequate, and working conditions are increasingly difficult.

TCTA’s approach is simple:

• Provide an across-the-board pay raise for teachers and other nonadministrative personnel.

• Ensure that districts receive new money to meet other needs (such as additional staffing, safety enhancements, etc.).

• Improve the tools available for addressing discipline problems.

• Limit the amount of time that teachers are spending outside of the school day, and on non-instructional duties.

So far this session, lawmakers have a mixed record on addressing these issues.

Salaries

An early proposal to increase salaries by $15,000 across the board and provide raises for support personnel matched TCTA’s approach with its simplicity and comprehensive provisions, though we knew the recommended amount was unlikely to pass. The House and Senate bills proposing this raise have never received a hearing. Instead, the two chambers are taking very different routes, neither of which is particularly simple or at all comprehensive.

When TCTA members visited the Capitol in February, a display showcased State Rep. James Talarico’s goal of a $15,000 pay raise for teachers. By mid-session in April, the House and Senate bills proposing this raise have never received a hearing. Instead, the two chambers are taking very different routes, neither of which is particularly simple or at all comprehensive.

Senate Bill 9 does provide an across-the-board increase of sorts, providing teachers in larger districts with a $2,000 raise, bumping that amount to $6,000 in districts with enrollment under 20,000 students. However, it only applies to classroom teachers, and, worst of all, it’s not a true raise but a one-time stipend as it is only in effect for the 2023-24 school year.

HB 100 undertakes a complicated restructure of the state minimum salary schedule, eliminating the 20-step schedule and replacing it with salary ranges, each of which has differing levels depending on the teacher’s certification type

Continued on page 18 and whether the teacher has earned a distinction through the Teacher Incentive Allotment program. The minimum amounts are higher for each grouping than current minimum salaries, but the fact that the schedule maxes out at 10 years is concerning to veteran teachers who have experienced salary stagnation at the top of the current schedule.

HB 100 also revises provisions from 2019’s HB 3 requiring that a percentage of new state funding be used for compensation, increasing that percentage from 30% to 50%. TCTA supports the requirement that new funding be directed to salaries, but we found that without language directing that a specified amount of new funding be passed through to all current educators, the benefits of the HB 3 approach varied greatly from district to district in 2019.

New money

Both the House and Senate are proposing to put billions of dollars of new money into education. Both versions of the budget propose $5 billion in new funding, along with another $2.4 billion through the school finance formulas. But that amount is not as generous as it may sound, especially given the extraordinary $34 billion budget surplus that the legislature is dealing with.

The House budget specifies that the new funding is intended to address compensation and benefits, increases in the basic allotment, the Teacher Incentive Allotment, school safety, curriculum/materials and/or special education. Given that a $5,000 across-the-board increase for educators alone would cost over $5.5 billion, $7.4 billion in new funding is not going to be the “transformative” fix that lawmakers have touted.

A key provision in the Senate budget makes the $5 billion contingent on the passage of four proposals — a “teachers’ rights” bill (such as SB 9, which includes the salary proposal), a voucher plan, a school safety bill, and a bill regarding special education funding. Under this provision, new school funding is specifically tied to passage of vouchers, a “poison pill” for school districts.

Discipline

TCTA has met with some success in the area of student discipline, working with legislators (especially Sen. Charles Perry, author of SB 245) to make it easier for teachers to remove disruptive students from the classroom without facing the dreaded “revolving door” that sends the student right back without real consequences for their behavior. One study found that of the 50% of teachers who leave the field permanently, almost 35% report the reason is related to problems with student discipline.

But some groups and lawmakers have concerns about “exclusionary” practices that take students away from the learning environment, and have opposed bills like SB 245. TCTA opposes any efforts that would restrict a teacher’s ability to remove a disruptive student from the classroom.

Teacher time

One of the most crucial aspects of resolving the teacher shortage also seems to be one of the hardest to fix. Countless studies have cited the amount of time that teachers spend outside the school day on both instruction-related duties (grading, planning, tutoring, professional development) and non-instructional requirements (bus duty, staff meetings) as a contributing factor to teacher burnout.

TCTA has proposed that districts should not be able to require teachers to work for more than 30 minutes outside the instructional day for more than two days per month unless the teacher agrees to a supplemental duties contract that specifies and includes compensation for the additional required time. There was an attempt to incorporate language similar to TCTA’s in SB 9, but the language was revised to the point that it would not accomplish the goal. Lawmakers have balked at fully addressing the issue of teacher time and duties, and have so far punted by requiring that TEA conduct a study of teacher time, as recommended by the Teacher Vacancy Task Force.

Good news for retirees

Retiree benefits are a rare bright spot this session with a benefit increase almost certain to pass, though even the prospect of increased retirement checks could cause problems for active teachers. Both the House and Senate have plans to increase retiree benefits through a cost-of-living adjustment for most retirees and a supplemental check for older retirees, though the details of the plans differ. The House includes a more ambitious proposal that allows for the possibility of ongoing increases in the future, dependent on how well the fund’s investments perform. That bill, HB 600, is the more expensive option and would require both the state and active employees to increase their TRS contributions from the currently-planned 8.25% (the 2022-23 rate is 8%) to 9%. (Read more about retiree benefits on page 9.)

Undue focus on special programs

One of the disappointing aspects of the report from the Teacher Vacancy Task Force was an undue focus on measures that reflect priorities of certain policymakers, including the commissioner of education, rather than the real needs expressed by teachers. These proposals are not all bad — TCTA supports some of them — but they are not fixes for the teacher shortage.

We think legislators should be focusing on the problems that are driving teachers away from the profession, but the bills serving as the main vehicles for recommendations of the task force are rife with these extraneous and sometimes costly propositions. The major teacher bills — SB 9, HB 11 and HB 100 — include these additional programs:

• Rural pathway excellence partnership (HB 100) — a plan to support underserved students and promote economic development in rural areas.

• Retired teacher reimbursement grants (SB 9, HB 11) — funding to cover the surcharge paid by the district for hiring certain retired teachers.

• Teacher quality assistance (SB 9, HB 11) — help for districts from TEA in areas including strategic compensation (this can include TIA expansion/ modification), staffing and scheduling.

• Teacher Incentive Allotment expansion (SB 9, HB 11) — a new base level designation and increases in most of the amounts awarded to the other designation levels.

• Local optional teacher designation system grant program (SB 9, HB 11) — grants to districts for assistance with local TIA plans

• Teacher residency partnership program (SB 9, HB 11) — a program involving partnerships between education preparation programs and school districts that pairs teacher certification candidates with cooperating teachers. The resident completes a yearlong clinical teaching assignment under the supervision of the cooperating teacher before obtaining a standard teaching certificate.

With the session ending on May 29, there is still time to refocus lawmakers on the things that matter. If you haven’t already discussed with your elected state legislators the issues that are making teachers leave and the remedies that would slow or stop the mass exodus, now is the time. Send an email or pick up the phone; have a long conversation with the legislator or leave a short message with a staffer — in the end, your self-advocacy is a much-needed supplement to TCTA’s work at the Capitol.