Updated U.S. Armed Forces Enlistment Guidance

To the Superintendent Addressed:

The purpose of this communication is to notify public school districts and open-enrollment charter schools of updated guidance for reporting enlistment in the U.S. Armed Forces in the fall 2020 TSDS PEIMS submission.

General Guidance

Last fall the agency conducted numerous district special accreditation investigations in response to inflated and potentially bad faith reporting of students enlisting or intending to enlist in the U.S. Armed Forces.  As a result of actions on the part of certain districts, the agency revises its guidance from allowing districts significant discretion when reporting, to only accepting data that includes students falling into one of two categories: Confirmed Actual Enlistment and Confirmed Imminent Enlistment.  

While the agency continues to work with the Department of Defense to obtain source data that accurately and precisely documents military enlistment, each district will continue to decide the methodology for collecting and documenting this indicator, subject to the following agency guidance:

• “Confirmed Actual Enlistment” means students who, by December 31 immediately following high school graduation, are confirmed to be enlisted in the military
• “Confirmed Imminent Enlistment” means students who, on the day of graduation, will enlist in the military by December 31 immediately following high school graduation
• The methodology used must be developed and applied in good faith and not intended to artificially inflate the CCMR indicator
• The methodology used must be reasonably calculated to accurately determine within a reasonable margin of error the Confirmed Actual Enlistment and Confirmed Imminent Enlistment of its graduating class
• Districts must maintain verifiable, supporting documentation that may be reasonably determined by the agency to conclusively demonstrate and accurately account for Confirmed Actual Enlistment and Confirmed Imminent Enlistment
• This documentation may be subject to audit by the agency

Examples of methodologies that may be determined as bad faith if utilized by a district include, but are not be limited to the following:

• Reporting students based solely on the district inducing student contact with a military recruiter (i.e. holding an assembly in the cafeteria with a military recruiter where student attendance is required or otherwise prompted by the district)
• A district soliciting student signatures on forms, including but not limited to senior surveys, indicating the student’s intent to enlist in the military when the district possesses no other documented evidence of Confirmed Imminent Enlistment
• Reporting students who have taken, but failed, the ASVAB
• Reporting students based solely on a student taking the ASVAB when the test is administered by the district but possesses no additional evidence of enlistment once the student receives the results of the test
• Reporting a student when there is evidence that the district is aware that the student is disqualified from military service
• Reporting students when the district possesses no or inadequate documentation

 Recommended Methodology

To demonstrate Confirmed Actual Enlistment, the agency will accept verifiable documentation from a military recruiter such as an email indicating enlistment, or any official Department of Defense document showing enlistment and acceptance into the United States military, so long as the enlistment occurs by December 31 immediately following high school graduation. 

Additionally, the agency will consider it a rebuttable presumption that a district’s methodology used to determine Confirmed Imminent Enlistment is developed in good faith if the district’s methodology includes showing documented evidence of each of the following:

1. The student obtains a passing score on the ASVAB;
2. The student engages in a one on one meeting with a military recruiter at the request of the student;
3. After passing the ASVAB and meeting with the military recruiter, the student executes a form indicating the intent to enlist in the military by December 31 immediately following high school graduation and the student personally delivers the form to the district and the military recruiter; and
4. There is no evidence indicating that the student has been disqualified from military service or has otherwise indicated a subsequent lack of intent to enlist in the military.

For all students reported with methodologies other than the recommended methodology, the burden is on the district to demonstrate that it has otherwise complied with the standards set out in this guidance.  Any district relying upon a methodology other than this recommended methodology acknowledges that compliance is solely determined by the Commissioner of Education.

Reporting

Each fall districts report military enlistment for the graduating class from the previous year in the TSDS PEIMS submission. Students should only be reported as enlisted in the United States Armed Forces if documentation supports Confirmed Actual Enlistment and/or Confirmed Imminent Enlistment. Districts use Element ID E1589 to indicate whether students enlisted in the United States Armed Forces. The data may be updated any time until the January resubmission deadline.

WARNING

EVIDENCE OF BAD FAITH REPORTING ON THE PART OF THE DISTRICT MAY LEAD TO AGENCY INTERVENTIONS INCLUDING THE LOWERING OF THE DISTRICT’S ACCREDITATION RATING,  INSTALLATION OF A MONITOR, CONSERVATOR, AND/OR BOARD OF MANAGERS, AND ANY OTHER INTERVENTION ALLOWED BY LAW. ANY INDIVIDUAL SUSPECTED OF ENGAGING IN BAD FAITH BEHAVIOR INTENDED TO DEFRAUD THE ACCOUNTABILITY SYSTEM MAY BE REFERRED TO THE STATE BOARD FOR EDUCATOR CERTIFICATION FOR REVIEW OF THE OFFENDER’S CERTIFICATION.

If you have any questions, please contact the Performance Reporting Division at (512) 463-9704 or performance.reporting@tea.texas.gov. 

Thank you.