KILLEEN, Texas — Killeen Independent School District teachers and employees will see a pay increase next year due to the district's school board approving of the largest salary increase in nine years.
According to school officials, the district's board of trustees unanimously passed the 2023 compensation plan, which will give an 8% raise for all Texas Teacher Evaluation and Support System (T-TESS) appraised educators, and a 6% increase for all other district employees.
With this increase, the starting salary for a beginning teacher will be $56,160, according to a news release. A new teacher with no experience currently gets $52,000 a year, one of the higher salaries in the area.
"There is a multitude of reasons for people to want to move to Killeen ISD, we have it right here before you," said School Board President JoAnn Purser to her colleagues.
Certain stipends are also set to increase including one that targets one of the fastest growing student populations and programs in KISD.
"There is a tremendous shortage of bilingual certified educators across the state. We recognize that so we're wanting to try to provide a $7,500 stipend on top of what we're going to be offering with our classroom teacher starting pay and pay scale", said Superintendent Dr. John Craft.
The special education self-contained teacher stipend is set to increase to $5,000 and a new relocation stipend of $2,000 was created for teachers moving to the district, per officials.
“The newly approved compensation plan is comprehensive, competitive, and demonstrates the critically important role our staff plays in the lives of our students. Our priority is to adequately staff the classroom as teaching and learning remains our core business,” said Craft.
Craft said there are different raises between staff because the main focus and business of school is the classroom and they have to close in on the teacher vacancies.
With over 300 vacancies, the district said its reached a critical point. Officials say the district has had difficulty with recruitment in the past, so they are hoping to incentivize teachers to stay with 'longevity pay'. It will be given to all staff members who've completed five cumulative years within the district.
"We want to and recognize those that stay with the district. They have tenure in the district gonna stay in the district and so we're gonna try to make it very, very attractive and hard for them to leave," said Craft.
According to Killeen school officials, the district is one of few to offer longevity pay for professional and auxiliary employees who've completed five cumulative years with KISD. Additionally, former KISD employees will be able to return to the district and receive credit for their previous KISD years of service, officials say.
For example, if a high school math teacher left KISD after six years and returns after two years in another district to teach they will earn $69,560 if they move inside of the district boundaries.
The approved changes would have the districts payroll make up 84% of budget. An investment the board is willing to make and many staff members can get behind.
Rachel Bourrage is a paraprofessional for the district and also the President of the Killeen Educators association. She and others have been asking for this raise for a long time and she says it's long overdue.
"It didn't just happen overnight," she said. "This process, this big event that happened tonight took a lot of time, a lot of patience, a lot of people, a lot of meetings. So, it was worth coming to it … was well worth it."
Killeen ISD staff will get notices of the salary changes in the next couple of weeks and are urged to watch their e-mail.
Officials also say the compensation package would be absorbed in the district's budget and not impact the tax rate on citizens.
View the approved compensation plan and new teacher pay scale for 2022 - 2023, here.
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