Educate Texas - Philanthropy Advocates

Since 2012, Philanthropy Advocates has commissioned timely, relevant research to provide credible, reliable information to Texas legislators, their staff and other advocates and partners. View our Archived Research & Advocacy pages to view our work to date.

Philanthropy Advocates was formerly known as the Texas Education Grantmakers Advocacy Consortium (TEGAC) until August 2020. Previously-created resources, documents and blog posts mentioning TEGAC are still provided on this website for your reference.

Texas Transfer Landscape: Setting the context of policies and partnerships addressing student transfer

Read this report that provides an overview of the state policies supporting student transfers, a summary of key groups addressing transfer in Texas, and a discussion of strengths and challenges facing Texas students today.

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Doing More With Less: Public Education in a New Fiscal Reality

The first collaborative project through TEGAC was an objective and thorough exploration of how $5.4 billion in cuts to public education impacted Texas schools and students after the 2011 Legislative Session. Member foundations from across Texas pooled their funds to commission a Houston-based nonprofit, Children At Risk, to undertake a year-long, mixed-methods statewide study to objectively assess how budget reductions impacted public schools – for better or for worse. Hundreds of school districts responded to the voluntary survey.

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Policy Opportunities to Further Enable Success of Pre-K Partnerships

In the past several years, Texas leaders have taken multiple steps to bolster Pre-K partnerships between school districts and childcare programs. In 2019, the Texas Legislature passed House Bill 3 (HB 3), a school finance bill that included state dollars to prioritize early childhood education. This legislation coupled with other state efforts indicates momentum for Pre-K Partnerships as a strategy for increasing access to high-quality early childhood education across Texas. This document serves as an overview of policy opportunities to further enable success of Pre-K partnerships.

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Research: Exploring Systems for College Readiness in Texas

Research by Texas Tech University, commissioned by Philanthropy Advocates, on Texas policies defining student coursework patterns and college readiness standards

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Research: Exploring Impact of Teacher Certification Policy on Educator Workforce

Research by University of Houston, commissioned by Philanthropy Advocates, on Texas teacher certification policies Through both preparation routes and policies permitting uncertified teachers to serve as classroom teachers, there are many routes to prepare teachers to meet workforce demand. In the face of staffing challenges, flexibility is available for school districts to hire uncertified teachers. We aimed to understand the impact of this practice on students and the overall teacher workforce pipeline.

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