This article describes how to get started on an estimate of CTE funding under HB 1525.
Many of you may be wondering how to estimate your CTE allotment next year. Under the provisions of HB 1525, the base for funding is now the sum of the basic allotment and the small / midsized allotment per student. This is welcome news for some of you who found after last session that as you added CTE students you lost overall revenue because of the interaction between the small / midsized allotment and CTE. This statutory change in HB 1525 adds funding to the FSP system for small and midsized districts.
But a second change to the CTE allotment got less attention. Under the new provisions from HB 1525, FTEs for students not in an approved program of study would draw a weight of 1.1, FTEs for students in level 1 and 2 courses in an approved program of study would draw a weight of 1.28, and FTEs for students in level 3 and 4 courses would draw a weight of 1.47. On a statewide basis, we think the change in the weight is close to cost neutral, but individual districts may gain or lose funding from the provision depending on which courses students are taking.
Unfortunately, your student information system cannot yet produce a report for you that calculates FTEs by weight, and getting to that point might take some time. You can see which courses draw down which weights on the TEA website here:
Approved CTE Programs of Study | Texas Education Agency
We have posted a spreadsheet here that shows an estimated percentage of students that would qualify under the various weights based on data from 2019-2020.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/o9od...
The data for your district has likely changed since the 2019-2020 school year, and so the percentages won't match 2020-2021, let alone 2021-2022. However, it might give you a place to start. You could begin by taking the total number of CTE FTEs you expect for next year and dividing them across the weights based on the proportions noted in the spreadsheet. If someone in your district can pull 2020-2021 course-taking data based on the courses you see from the TEA website, even better.
