Texas Tiers of Intensity Funding Model: How Frontline Is Preparing

Our target is mid-July availability, which gives districts several weeks to work through their caseloads before the first PEIMS Attendance Submission deadline on October 8. We specifically set a summer goal rather than a “before October 8” goal because we heard clearly from districts that they need meaningful working time, not just enough runway to click through a few screens during the week of the deadline. We will keep you updated, and we will be transparent if anything about that timeline changes.

Over the last several weeks, we have met with more than 10 Texas districts across a range of sizes (small, medium, large, and extra-large) and worked alongside Texas policy consultants to shape the product approach, attending every TEA vendor meeting since this work began. The tool has been built from real district conversations and real IEP data throughout. We know calibration matters, and the explainer feature (which shows exactly what evidence was used and why each score was assigned) is specifically designed to support that kind of review.

The recommendation engine is built to be updated as TEA clarifies or changes its rubric, so when guidance evolves, we can adjust the logic without requiring districts to redo their work. For district-facing communications, we will use the Learning Center, direct emails, and webinar updates when anything significant shifts. Your CVP is also the right contact if you hear something in the field and want to know whether Frontline is tracking it. We are attending TEA vendor meetings regularly and have Texas policy consultants involved in the work, so we are not waiting for guidance to filter through secondhand.

We have had access to TEA’s intensity-of-services rubric throughout development and have been building directly from it. The engine scores students across five domains (Curriculum & Instruction Supports, Behavioral Supports, Communication Supports, Independent Functioning Supports, and Personal Care/Health Supports), each evaluated across four factors (A through D), exactly as TEA’s rubric describes. It reads from data already documented in your IEP (services, minutes, support conditions, provider credentials, and accommodations) and maps that evidence to scores across all five domains. The explainer feature within the tool will show exactly what evidence was used for each student’s recommendation.

Both options are available. For existing students, the tool supports bulk processing, meaning you can generate recommendations across your entire caseload at once. For new or revised IEPs going forward, recommendations generate automatically as part of the IEP finalization process. Your team reviews and can override recommendations regardless of how they were generated.

For the ongoing automation workflow, yes. The recommendation triggers as part of IEP finalization, so the ARD needs to be complete. For bulk processing of existing students, the tool reads from the most recently finalized IEP on record.

Yes, minutes do need to be documented. The calculation engine works from minutes, so Schedule of Services entries documented in periods or other time units will need to be converted before the tool can calculate accurately for those services.

We will include specific guidance on this in the launch documentation.

The recommendation engine applies TEA’s rubric criteria by reading what is actually documented in the IEP (goals, service types, support conditions, credentials, and accommodations) and produces a score with a plain-language explanation. For factors that involve professional judgment, the tool surfaces a recommendation and explains its reasoning, but it does not replace ARD committee review.

Consistency across reviewers is one of the things we have heard districts worry about most, and the explainer feature is specifically designed to address that. When two staff members look at the same recommendation, they are both looking at the same evidence and the same reasoning, which makes disagreements easier to resolve and easier to document.

Your team can override any recommendation with documented rationale, and because every override requires that documentation, the changes are traceable for compliance purposes. We will have specific guidance on documentation practices in the launch materials.

Yes. The bulk processing workflow reads from the most recently finalized IEP for each student, so you do not need to wait for new ARDs to get started. That covers the scenario most districts are planning for right now, which is reviewing a full caseload of students who already have IEPs before the school year begins.

For new IEPs going forward, the recommendation generates at finalization, which means after the ARD committee has approved the schedule of services.

The practical recommendation is to begin working through existing students as soon as the tool is available in mid-July, which gives you the August early submission window as a checkpoint before the October 8 deadline.

The tool is being developed across Frontline’s SPM products: eSped, SuccessEd, and Plan Management. It will be provided at no cost to all districts.

The tool is designed to work from data you are already maintaining in Frontline rather than requiring staff to re-enter information on a separate screen. The recommendation appears directly on the student record, populated from IEP data already there.

The TEA rubric includes factors that may not currently be captured in a structured, calculable format in every district’s documentation (such as provider credentials, 1:1 support details, and certain related service entries), so some documentation updates may be needed.

Before launch, we will publish specific documentation identifying which data points the calculation uses, what is already available in the current IEP structure, and where districts may need to review their documentation practices. Additionally, new fields are being added in the appropriate location for each application to address this need.

We are planning two distinct output formats. The first includes the full domain and factor score breakdown, which is intended for districts participating in the August early submission window and for anyone who wants the detailed scoring rationale for review and calibration.

The second is a streamlined output with the tier and service group result without the full factor detail, designed for standard submission use.

Both are part of our reporting plan, and we will have more specifics on format and availability in the coming weeks. The tool reads from finalized (locked) IEPs, so it can process ARDs finalized in the 2025–2026 school year. Supporting both transition-year PEIMS submissions is also part of the plan, with the October 8 first submission as the primary focus for launch.

Guardrails are built into the design in two ways.

1. The recommendation engine applies TEA’s rubric logic consistently across your caseload, reducing the risk of individual reviewers scoring factors differently.
2. Every recommendation includes a plain-language explanation showing what evidence was found, what score was assigned for each factor, and why.

Because every override requires documented rationale, the changes are traceable for compliance purposes.

The full audit trail captures every recommendation, every override, every reviewer, and every timestamp, providing a documented history of how a student’s tier was determined.

Step-by-step documentation will be available at or before launch in the Frontline Learning Center.

We will share more about the full training approach, including any live training sessions, in upcoming updates.

In the meantime, the most impactful thing you can do is audit your existing Schedule of Services data:

• Document services in minutes rather than periods or frequency shorthand.
• Verify service types are accurately categorized.
• Ensure related services for speech, AT, and transportation are captured.
• Review provider credentials and 1:1 support documentation.

SIS and PEIMS readiness is one of the five focus areas in our development plan. We will be publishing updated file specifications to account for the new Tiers of Intensity data elements.

If you have a direct integration, your SIS contact or vendor will need those updated specifications to receive the new fields. If your district currently sends PEIMS data manually or via file upload, you will use those same specifications to format and submit the new data.

We are building for both workflows so districts without a direct integration still have a clear path to submit Tier and Service Group data before October 8.

Transition-year reporting, where both the instructional arrangement/setting codes and the new tier, service group, and minutes elements must be submitted, is a specific requirement we are accounting for in the design.

Data validation features are part of the tool, and we will document what validations run and how errors are surfaced before launch.

The full audit trail also supports your review process if TEA questions a submission.

The most productive thing you can do between now and our mid-July launch is audit your existing IEP data.

Focus on:

• Schedule of Services entries documented in minutes rather than periods or frequency shorthand
• Related service documentation
• Provider credentials
• Accommodation and support details

Districts that arrive at mid-July with clean, complete documentation in those areas will get better results from the recommendation engine, with less manual cleanup.

We are working with Texas policy consultants to build calibration support directly into the tool so rubric interpretation is not left entirely to individual district judgment.

The explainer feature is designed to help teams understand how the rubric applies to specific students and build consistency across reviewers.

We will have guidance materials at launch that walk through each domain and factor with practical examples, and training resources will be available in the Learning Center.

We have committed dedicated resources across our three SPM platforms, engaged Texas policy consultants, attended every TEA vendor meeting since the new funding model was announced. We have also met with more than 10 Texas districts to make sure we are solving the right problems.

The goal is to replace the manual, student-by-student process the state tool requires with a workflow that reads from IEP data already in Frontline, generates recommendations your team reviews and approves, and connects to your SIS and PEIMS submission without requiring staff to move data by hand across multiple systems.

Our target is mid-July availability, and we will keep communicating clearly between now and then.