What is a star level worth to your center?
Before you decide whether this is worth a Saturday, find out what it is worth to your center. The Texas Workforce Commission publishes a Texas Rising Star Revenue Calculator. Enter your board, your ages, your scholarship enrollment, and your current level, and it will tell you what the next star level pays you.
Open the state revenue calculatorThis downloads a spreadsheet from the State of Texas.
Say your center serves 45 subsidized children and your 2 star reimbursement runs about $34 a day per child. State law sets a 3 star rate about 2 percent higher for the same care. That is roughly 68 cents more per child each day, about $153 a week, and close to $7,600 a year for moving up one star. Reach 4 star and the gap grows again.
Illustration only. Your real number depends on your board, ages, and enrollment. Run the calculator above for your center.
State law sets the floor. A certified provider's minimum rate must exceed the maximum non certified rate for the same category of care by at least 5 percent at 2 star, 7 percent at 3 star, and 9 percent at 4 star, under Texas Government Code 2308.315.
That number is the reason for this session. Everything below is how you get there.
Why Category 2 and not the others
Look at what it costs to move each category. Category 1 means hiring or credentialing staff. Category 4 means furniture, materials, and facility work. Both require capital, and if you had capital sitting there you would have spent it already.
Category 2 is teacher and child interactions. It costs coaching. It is the heaviest weighted category in the rubric and the only one you can move with people you already employ, in classrooms you already have, starting the week after this session.
What changes in the classroom
Category 2 is not a form. It is what a teacher does in the small moments with a child. Here is what those moments look like now, and what they look like once you coach them on purpose.
- A meltdown gets "You're okay, go sit down."
- Cleanup is a rushed "Hurry up, line up."
- "Did you have fun?" A yes, and the talk stops.
- Every drawing earns the same "Good job."
- No one watches the interaction, so it never changes.
- "You're frustrated. Do you want blocks or books?"
- Cleanup becomes a counting song the room follows.
- "What do you think happens next?" opens real talk.
- "You shared the red cup. Now try offering the blue."
- Each teacher is coached on one focus and grows.
Here is why you are paying me.
Your board assigns you a mentor at no cost and offers free professional development, and you should use both.
What a mentor does
Tells you where you are not meeting the standard.
What no one teaches you
How to walk into your own classroom on Tuesday, watch a teacher for fifteen minutes, name the one behavior that matters most, and run a conversation that changes what she does on Wednesday. That is a different skill and nobody hands it to you.
What you leave with
A written, dated coaching cycle for the next quarter, built on your own classrooms, ready to run the next business day. Plus the working packet:
- Category 2 rubric reference
- Observation capture sheets
- The Coaching Ladder
- Coaching conversation template with a worked example
- The cycle planning template
You will be able to walk into any room in your center, identify the single highest leverage behavior to grow, and run the conversation that grows it.
The honest timeline
This is not a rate increase in October. The chain runs in order:
- You coach the interactions.
- Your Category 2 score moves at your next assessment.
- Your star level follows.
- Your rate follows that.
Certification work can run up to 24 months from entry level, so where you land depends on where you already sit in your assessment cycle.
Come knowing that. What this session buys you is the ability to start moving the score now instead of after the next assessment tells you what you already suspected.
The real cost
$149 is the ticket. The rest of the cost is your Saturday and roughly one observation cycle per quarter afterward, which is what the plan you build is scaled to. If you cannot protect that time, this will not work and you should keep your money.
This session: Saturday, September 26, 2026. The training repeats the fourth Saturday of every month. Twenty five seats. Clock hours are issued for live attendance. Break and lunch are not counted toward training hours. Purchase orders and invoices available, email jennifer@bookmcg.com.
Have questions first? Email us your questions
Full refund on cancellations received in writing on or before September 19, 2026. After September 19, registrations are not refundable but may be transferred to a future session or to a substitute participant from the same center at no charge. Participants who do not attend are not eligible for a refund or a transfer. Clock hours are issued for live attendance only and cannot be earned by watching a recording. If Murchison Consulting Group cancels the session for any reason, all registrants receive a full refund. Purchase orders and invoiced registrations must be paid in full before the session date. To cancel, transfer, or request an invoice, email jennifer@bookmcg.com.
About the trainer
Jennifer Murchison, M.Ed., founder of Murchison Consulting Group and a TECPDS registered trainer, Trainer ID 254864. Twenty three years in education leadership including service as a Chief Academic Officer and campus leader. M.Ed. in Educational Leadership, Houston Christian University.
Reserve your seat
Twenty five seats per session. Live attendance earns 7 clock hours toward your professional development credit.
Have questions first? Email us your questions