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Pugerville ISDprioritizes employee retention
Pugerville ISD ocials to continue monitoring COVID-19 numbers As the delta and omicron variants of COVID-19 continue to make the rounds throughout Central Texas and beyond, Pugerville ISD Superintendent Doug Killian said district ocials will keep monitoring the situation. The district will maintain a partnership with Austin Public Health and Travis County for vaccine clinics, Killian said. “We are seeing an uptrend in the number of folks coming to those clinics,” Killian said. Killian said one clinic within the district administered 200 vaccinations during the month of December, which was a record for the PfISD program. PfISD policy was up to date as of press time Jan. 5. Hutto ISD receives annual TEA report The Texas Education Agency released its 2020-21 report on Hutto ISD in December. The report contains an array of statistics that include academic performance numbers, district demographics and dropout rates. The report states 40% of Hutto ISD students met or exceeded grade level expectations on the 2021 State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness tests, down from 49% in 2019.
BY BRIAN RASH
RETENTION PLAN Pugerville ISD ocials approved two measures to boost sta pay that will go into eect this spring. STIPEND • Total of $2 million
With school districts throughout Central Texas strug- gling to hire sta, including Pugerville ISD, district o- cials are ramping up strategies to shore up sta retention and recruitment. As part of that campaign, board members during a Dec. 16 meeting approved two measures involving monetary stipends and compensation boosts. First, the board approved a one-time stipend for eligible employees totaling $2 million. Next, the board voted to approve a pay bump for hourly employees totaling $1 million. Prior to the Dec. 16 PfISD board meeting, Superinten- dent Doug Killian said stang issues within the district have been prevalent for more than a year, though he said he could not yet provide specics of where the biggest decits are occurring within PfISD. PfISD Chief Financial Ocer Jennifer Land said the stipend amounts to a $500 one-time payment in February to all eligible employees, meaning they must be in good standing and not planning to leave the district. District documents state the money will come from a budget surplus from scal year 2020-21. The district also ratied a market-based compensation adjustment totaling $1 million, which PfISD documents state will come from unused maintenance and operation
HOURLY RAISE • Total of $1 million • For hourly sta only • Raises all applicable hourly jobs to $15 per hour in spring 2022
• Amounts to one-time payment of $500 per employee in spring 2022 • For eligible employees only
SOURCE: PFLUGERVILLE ISDCOMMUNITY IMPACT NEWSPAPER
funds from dicult-to-ll vacant positions. The pay adjustment shifts minimum pay for various hourly sta positions throughout the district up to $15 per hour. As one example, district documents show a bus monitor and day custodian positions will go up from $13.19 per hour to $15 per hour. Killian said the pay bump for hourly employees is necessary. Without support from hourly sta, teachers are not free to focus on their main job of teaching, he said. “I’ve never been in a position where I’ve had to do middle-of-the-year pay increases,” Killian said. “This is unlike anything I’ve ever seen in my career.”
Hutto ISD stadium opening provides new opportunities
to the stadium include increased seating capacity from 4,700 to 10,000, a new multilevel press box, new restrooms and improved disability access. Construction on the renovations began in February. Though the stadium will host all kinds of sporting events, its use extends beyond that, Hutto ISD board President Billie Logiudice said. Cameras and production equipment in the stadium’s press box will be
STAAR performance
• 98.3% attendance rate in 2019-20 school year, up from 96.4% in 2018- 19 • 93.9% graduation rate for class of 2020, down from 96.3% for class of 2019 • 80.1% college, career or military readiness rate in 2019-220, down from 81.1% in 2018-19
BY CARSON GANONG
largely operated by students, provid- ing opportunities to gain experience in elds such as video production and journalism. The renovations doubled the stadium’s seating and added a press box.
The newly-renovated Hutto Memorial Stadium is ocially open following a ribbon-cutting ceremony Dec. 10. The $17.8 million renovations made
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