SMCISD receives recommendations for employee compensation
Retaining employees is an essential part of any organization, and school districts are no different. Amy Campbell, Texas Association of School Boards Human Resources Services director, gave a presentation on employee compensation and recommended possible changes at the special San Marcos Consolidated Independent School District board meeting Monday.
“We collect a lot of your data, and we’re matching that to market data and peer information,” Campbell said. “We talk with district staff and district administrators at the beginning to find out what’s working well — we want to protect stuff that’s working well — and find out what’s not working well, so we can target some corrective measures. The good and bad news is that every district is struggling with the same things. The lists are pretty consistent across the entire state, no matter the size and location of districts.”
Campbell said that market rate would be 100% of the median market value.
“But know that individuals will be around that market rate based on their own demographics and characteristics,” Campbell said. “If I’ve got a lot of experience, and I bring a bunch of credentials and skills and abilities, you would expect me to be above market. And that is appropriate. If I am new to the position [and] if I am just learning my job and I’m new to the district, you might expect me to be below market. And that is perfectly acceptable. We want people to be spread around that market rate.”
Campbell said SMCISD has a large district of market peers with districts surrounding the Austin and San Antonio areas, which are of varying sizes. For hourly jobs, teachers and professional level jobs, the market is using those districts. However, senior administrative positions are compared to districts with enrollment between 7,000 to 1,299 across the state.
“We also look at some teacher demographics … When we look at teachers, we look at 5, 10, 15 years [experience]. What do you pay at each of those benchmark years? We also look at average pay, and the average pay looks like what your average teacher experience looks like,” Campbell said. “44% of your teachers currently have five or fewer years of experience, which statewide is a relatively high percentage of inexperienced staff. And 65% have ten or fewer years of experience. In your standard, run-of-the-mill school district that’s about 50%, so your percentage of inexperienced teachers is higher. … We typically see higher percentages in growing districts, in urban and suburban districts. The thing to be aware of is that when you have less experienced staff, it takes more resources and time to grow and develop those teachers. Some districts have a practice of hiring inexperienced teachers because then you can grow them into the instructional practices that you want modeled.”
Campbell said that 70% of new hires have come to the district this year with no instructional experience at all.
“This has become very common to see this year. It’s just harder to find fully certified and trained teachers to fill positions,” Campbell said, adding that the majority of new hires across the state have no prior experience.
Campbell showed a graph with the market rate of pay and SMCISD rate of pay and SMCISD’s rate with longevity pay factored in. The SMCISD rate was below market rate but was closer to market rate for experienced teachers.
When you look at your market peers you’re ranking between 12th and 14th. So very much near the bottom as far as teacher pay goes,” Campbell said. “You’re roughly $2,000 below the middle of the group. Pretty significantly below where any of us would want to be.”
Campbell said for starting pay, SMCISD falls below Judson ISD (with the highest starting salary), Del Valle ISD, North East ISD, Seguin ISD, Pflugerville ISD, Round Rock ISD, Austin ISD, Eanes ISD, Dripping Springs ISD, New Braunfels ISD and Schertz-Cibolo-Universal City ISD, in that order.
SMCISD Superintendent Michael Cardona said that 93% of the SMCISD budget is spent on wages and salaries, and he asked if Campbell had that percentage for the districts with higher starting salary pay. Campbell said she didn’t have exact numbers but has presented to four or five of the districts that had a higher starting salary, and the percentage allocated to employee salaries and wages was below 93%.
“I think you’re definitely on the top end of that percentage,” Campbell said. “I think 80 to 85% is more commonly what I see.”
Campbell said with non-exempt positions, which are hourly staff, the pay was competitive with the market.
Campbell proposed structure adjustments such as an increase in starting salary. She proposed three cost models for general pay increase, which were one two or three percent increases across the board. She also proposed specific adjustments to different job groups.
“Strategic adjustments are for people… that are more than 10% below midpoint. It’s small adjustments to get those closer,” Campbell said. “And placement scale adjustments — that was mostly for your bus drivers just to make sure their pay aligns with experience. … One added recommendation, and given the lesser experience of your teachers, part of the heavy lift[ing] gets added to your mentor teachers to help support and develop your new teachers. So I think increasing that stipend carries a relatively small cost in the grand scheme of things, but definitely will help reward your mentor-teachers for all of the work they’re doing to support your new staff.”
