The Houston Independent School District’s ASPIRE Awards program, which gives performance-based bonuses to teachers and other school staff, has paid a record-breaking $31,407,858.61 to 15,703 HISD campus-based staff.
“HISD holds the highest of standards for academic student growth. We are so pleased that so many of our staff exceeded this standard,” said HISD Superintendent of Schools Abelardo Saavedra. “It is great to be able to have a board that supports such a cutting-edge program to recognize employees for making a positive impact on the lives of students.”
The ASPIRE Awards Program is one of the largest recognition programs in America. The program is based largely on both achievement data and value-added analysis as measured by SAS EVAAS —a statistical method used to measure teachers’ and schools’ impact on students’ academic progress rates from year to year.
The ASPIRE Awards Program model divides growth into four groups, known as quartiles. There was growth in all of the quartiles, but only those in the top half receive bonuses.
“There are teachers who did not receive an ASPIRE award this year. This does not necessarily mean that their students or their campus didn’t grow academically or that they are poor teachers. It simply means that their performance was not in the top 50 percent for last year across the district,” said Saavedra.
The total amount awarded across the district increased from approximately $24 million last year to more than $31 million this year. In total, 8,747 core instructional staff, 2,505 non-core instructional staff, 2,189 instructional support staff and teaching assistants, and 1,671 operational support staff members are receiving awards. The top bonus for a core teacher is $8,580, and the average bonus is $2,777.
For a searchable database of bonuses by school or teacher, click here.
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