San Felipe-Del Rio CISD outlines plan to pursue strategic compensation and enhanced TIA designation
Summary
District leaders told the board Nov. 17 that San Felipe-Del Rio CISD is part of a fall cohort to develop a strategic compensation system tied to the Teacher Incentive Allotment under House Bill 2; implementation is multi-year with stakeholder engagement next semester and potential pay changes not effective until 2027–28.
SAN FELIPE-DEL RIO CISD — District officials on Nov. 17 told the board they are participating in the state’s strategic compensation cohort under House Bill 2 and will work toward an enhanced Teacher Incentive Allotment (TIA) designation that could increase the district’s TIA funding by 10% if the district meets state requirements.
Sandra Hernandez, who led the presentation, said San Felipe-Del Rio CISD is one of 30 Texas districts in the fall cohort and described strategic compensation as “performance pay systems for teachers, principals and assistant principals.” She said the effort will replace traditional step-and-lane pay scales with systems that reward effectiveness and student growth and that the work is a multi-year process with a no-harm year during development.
Hernandez told trustees the district is in a comprehensive system analysis phase to align evaluation systems (TPES for administrators and TIA-compliant teacher evaluation models), professional development and compensation, and that the district will work with Region 15 and an external vendor (Steady State) to analyze data. She said the pay structure contemplated would not begin payouts until the 2027–28 school year and that current TIA allotments remain unchanged during development.
Board members asked whether the board needed to vote to enter the program and how the district would ensure that evaluation scores aligned with student outcomes. Hernandez said initial participation did not require board action but that any implementation altering pay structures would be presented to the board for approval. On evaluation congruence, Hernandez acknowledged districts must be confident that evaluation results correspond with student outcomes before tying pay to those measures.
President Mesa and other trustees praised the direction of the work and emphasized the need for stakeholder engagement. Hernandez said the second semester will focus on stakeholder meetings, visioning and building the plan to submit to TEA; the district will attend a strategic compensation convening in Richardson, Texas, in January as the next step.
What’s next: administration will continue a comprehensive system analysis, hold stakeholder engagement through spring, refine evaluation and assignment approaches, and return to the board with a proposed compensation plan for formal approval before any pay changes take effect.
