Houston ISD’s state-appointed board unanimously approved a new teacher evaluation system Thursday that will go into effect for the next school year.

The model, which will be used to evaluate the district’s roughly 11,000 teachers, looks similar to the current system that emphasizes classroom observations and student test score growth. However, the district plans to use the evaluation scores to partially determine the salaries of many employees starting in 2026-27, a change that has angered the district’s largest teachers union.

HISD board members, who have been supportive of Superintendent Mike Miles’ academic and labor proposals since they started running the district in mid-2023, voted 8-0 to adopt the updated evaluation model. Critics of the system have said the regular classroom observations amount to micromanagement and feed into a misguided pay-for-performance system.

“I’ll say no evaluation system is perfect, and I think any of us in the community who work in an organization, lead an organization, understand that,” board member Michelle Cruz Arnold said. “But from what I’ve seen so far, the attempt to try to recognize the concerns and address how we’re going to incorporate feedback and continue to improve is really important to me.” 

Under the system, 45 percent of a teacher’s evaluation score will be based on 10 to 20 brief classroom observations by campus administrators. Another 35 percent will depend on how much their students’ performance improves on various tests, including exams given throughout the school year and the state’s primary standardized exams, known as STAAR.

Another 15 percent is tied to lesson planning and professionalism measures, with the final 5 percent is linked to campuswide success.

HISD spent several months gathering recommendations from over 3,000 teachers and leaders, district administrators said. 

The final version does not include a controversial student survey component, which would have partially tied teacher evaluations to feedback from their students. District leaders said they removed student surveys after most campus-level committees opposed it.

HISD Deputy Chief of Academics Alyssa Murray Rocha, who helped design the plan, said administrators started designing the system with quality of instruction and student outcomes as two of the core components.

“We were leaving a portion of the pie to really be decided on by the teachers, and we’re really building this with their voice,” Rocha said. “And when we asked them about the student survey, the answer was a resounding ‘no’ to include it.”

Houston Education Association President Michelle Williams spoke in front of the board Thursday, arguing the district will continue “hemorrhaging” experienced teachers and won’t be able to attract high-performing educators at some higher-scoring schools with the system. 

“I’ve worked under many evaluation systems but TES is by far the worst I’ve seen,” Williams said. “It’s inequitable. It penalizes teachers with high-achieving students, emerging bilingual students and frankly, parents of children.” 

The evaluation system goes along with a “pay-for-performance” plan that would see teachers at about half of HISD schools earning $62,000 to $92,000, depending on their score. Teachers at the remaining schools participating in HISD’s campus overhaul system would continue to get paid as they currently are, earning some of the highest salaries in the district.

HISD has not released details of the potential 2026-27 pay plan.

Currently, an educator’s years of experience largely determines many teachers’ salary, while educators in overhauled schools can also earn more depending on the subject they teach.  

During discussion, board member Rolando Martinez asked HISD administrators if they had done additional research on the success of pay-for-performance in other districts. Miles cited the results of Dallas ISD’s system, which he helped create as the district’s superintendent in the mid-2010s. 

Dallas has seen strong retention among highly-rated teachers and lower retention rates with lower-rated educators, though local union leaders have argued the system is unfair and doesn’t accurately reflect teacher performance.

“Based on their long-term experience with this similar type of evaluation system, teacher retention is much better than across the state of Texas,” Miles said. 

DeBakey High School for Health Professionals physics teacher MinhDan Tran, however, argued pay-for-performance does not work and schools should not be treated like businesses. 

“The proposed teacher evaluation system seeks to have teachers compete with one another rather than work together toward a common goal by rewarding a few teachers and threatening the rest with termination,” Tran said. “You’re going to see teachers hiding resources, hoarding materials and not helping their colleagues. Who would want to help their competition at the risk of losing their own job?”

Angelica Perez is a general assignment reporter for the Landing’s education team. Find her @byangelicaperez on Instagram and X, or reach her directly at angelica@houstonlanding.org.

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