Conroe ISD: The school board unanimously approved an employee compensation plan

The video above is from a previous report: The Texas Education Agency is to form a task force to investigate the teacher shortage under Governor Abbott

At a special meeting of the CISD Board of Trustees on April 5, the board unanimously approved a staff pay plan that was presented at a workshop earlier in the afternoon.

The plan includes a $1,500 salary increase for teachers, a 2% increase for non-teachers and a starting salary for hourly employees starting at $13 an hour, and a new starting salary of $60,000 for teachers. Officials said the increases would help keep the district competitive with others in the area.

The pay increases, totaling $13.3 million, will be funded from the general budget, said Darrin Rice, CISD’s chief financial officer. While the district had planned raises for the next school year, Rice said later raises may not be forthcoming.

“It will be up to our legislature to vote to put more money into the system so that we can grant staff increases,” he said, referring to the state’s district funding formula.

In addition to the salary increases, the board approved a total of $1,500 in one-time grants for each employee through the Federal Elementary and Secondary School Relief Fund, paid at $500 in the fall and $1,000 in the spring. Rice said the grants represent $10 million of the $31 million available under ESSER III, the third round of awards that districts will receive for COVID-19-related relief efforts in 2020-21 .

The board workshop included a presentation by Jennifer Barton, a representative of the Texas Association of School Boards. The TASB compared the CISD’s pay plans and made recommendations, including proposing to introduce an across-the-board pay increase and continuing to monitor their pay plans. In the 2021-22 school year, teacher salaries in CISD were $700 above the local market median of $58,500.

Area school districts used for comparison include Aldine, Cy-Fair, Klein, Montgomery, New Caney, Spring and Tomball ISDs.

County officials said the new pay plan will emphasize strong starting salaries, market-based mid-level salaries and increasing starting rates for non-exempt employees.

Neighboring TISD, which also serves part of The Woodlands area, on April 12 approved a 4% median increase for all employees for fiscal year 2022-23 and a $12 hourly rate for hourly workers. The starting salary of the teacher is $57,500. Magnolia ISD, which also serves western portions of The Woodlands area, had not discussed any compensation changes for 2022-23 as of the end of April.

This article is courtesy of our ABC13 partners at Community Impact Newspapers.