Official Notification: Release of Final 2024–2025 FIRST Ratings

Texas’s school financial accountability rating system, known as the Financial Integrity Rating System of Texas (FIRST), provides accountability for Texas public schools on the quality of their financial management practices and that they improve these practices. The purpose of this letter is to inform Texas public school systems that the Final 2024–2025 FIRST ratings based on fiscal year 2024 are publicly available on the Texas Education Agency (TEA) website, as of November 6, 2025:

• School districts
• Charter schools

A previous “To the Administrator Addressed” letter dated August 7, 2025, instructed your school district or charter school to view its preliminary FIRST rating. The letter also provided information about the data the TEA analyzes to produce the rating and described the appeal process available to your school system. This appeals process is now complete, and the FIRST ratings are final.

Required Reporting

Within two months of the release of its final FIRST rating, your school system must announce and hold a public meeting to distribute a financial management report that explains the school system’s rating and its performance under each indicator for the current and previous year’s ratings. The report also must provide the financial information described in 19 Texas Administrative Code (TAC) §109.1001(q)(3). We encourage your school system to include in the report additional information that will be beneficial to stakeholders, especially information explaining any special circumstances that may have affected the school system’s performance under one or more of the indicators.

The required newspaper notice informing taxpayers of the meeting must be published no more than 30 days and no fewer than 10 days before the public meeting. Your school system may combine the meeting with a regularly scheduled board of trustees meeting.

For full requirements related to the report and meeting, see 19 TAC §109.1001(q). For a template your school system can use to develop its financial management report, see the TEA School FIRST web page for school districts or the Charter FIRST web page for charter schools.

Accreditation Status

Please note that the TEA considers a school system’s FIRST rating when assigning an accreditation status, as required by the accreditation status rules in 19 TAC §97.1055.

Contact Information

If you have questions about your school system’s FIRST rating, please contact  financialaccountability@tea.texas.gov.