SFDRCISD Earns “Superior” Rating in Financial Integrity from State

The Texas Education Agency’s Financial Integrity Rating System of Texas (FIRST) has rated San Felipe Del Rio CISD with an A on their 2023-2024 fiscal year. The score of 96 out of 100 is considered “Superior Achievement” by the TEA. FIRST is a rating system meant to hold public schools in Texas accountable for their financial management practices. FIRST ratings take independent audits as inputs in their assessment, and consider a multitude of other “indicators” to conclude how effectively districts utilize resources to support student learning.

At a public hearing held within a board meeting on December 15, district CFO Amy Childress announced the rating before the board and overviewed ‘indicators’, or standardized benchmarks, that determined the cumulative score.

“This hearing is to announce that the district received a rating of A — Superior — with a score of 96%. This rating is the State’s highest, demonstrating the quality of our District’s financial management and reporting system,” Childress said to open her presentation.

Indicators serve as benchmarks by asking specific questions like “Was the school district in compliance with the payment terms of all debt agreements at fiscal year end?” and “Was the number of days of cash on hand and current investments in the general fund for the school district sufficient to cover operating expenditures?” Indicators were answered with either a Yes or No, or a 1-10. The answers to these two were Yes and 10, respectively.

Out of 21 Indicators, only two were less than perfect marks. Indicator 8 — which asked “Was the measure of current assets to current liabilities ratio for the school district sufficient to cover short term debt?” — received an 8 out of 10. A ratio of 3.0 or higher earns a 10; the District’s ratio was 2.9282.

Indicator 13 asked: “Was the school district’s administrative cost ratio equal to or less than the threshold ratio?” Because the District’s 10.69% ratio was not below the threshold of 10%, the district earned 8 out of 10 possible points. Compared to 2022-’23’s ratio of 11.96%, Childress notes that the District has made moves towards eventually meeting the State’s standard threshold.

“Our percentage was .1069, which is moving closer to the 10% due to district reorganization we have done the last couple of years when compared to prior years.”

FIRST results report that an independent audit, conducted by Crowe, LLP, returned a clean audit of SFDRCISD, with no instances of material noncompliance and no material weakness in internal controls during the 2023-’24 year.