ATPE Executive Director Shannon Holmes offers the following statement in response to Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick's Wednesday press conference outlining his priorities for allocating funds in the 2024-25 biennial budget:

"The lieutenant governor's priorities include 'concepts' that active and retired educators would welcome, including a teacher pay increase and either a cost-of-living adjustment or 13th check for retired teachers. We also appreciate the interest in providing student aid to future teachers and continuing school safety funding. At the 30,000-foot level, those sound good. But the devil is always in the details, and we urge lawmakers to listen to the feedback of public educators as they craft these plans to ensure they are designed to ultimately provide maximum benefit for Texas students.

"Similarly, we caution lawmakers as they examine legislation to raise the cap on the Rainy Day Fund. We need to strike a balance between overspending and sitting on tax dollars the state has collected from hard-working people. Texas school districts are struggling to recruit and retain educators. The budget surplus could go a long way toward attracting, retaining, and compensating educators, as well as ensuring our schools have ample resources to enact safety measures and upgrades."

About the Association of Texas Professional Educators (ATPE)
Founded in 1980, ATPE is the leading educators’ association in Texas with approximately 90,000 members statewide. With its strong collaborative philosophy, ATPE speaks for classroom teachers, administrators, and future, retired, and para-educators and works to create better opportunities for Texas’ five million public school students. | atpe.org