How to Complete and Submit the Texas Pre-Employment Affidavit

The Texas pre-employment affidavit is a disclosure form you must complete before any Texas public school district, charter school, service center, or shared services arrangement can hire you or bring you on as a service provider. It is adopted by the Texas Education Agency under Texas Education Code §22A.055 and asks about criminal history, prior investigations, licensing sanctions, past school employment, and any termination or resignation in lieu of termination. You can download the current version directly from TEA’s investigations page at tea.texas.gov.¹

Who Has to Fill It Out

The statute applies to every person applying for employment with, or planning to act as a service provider for, an “educational entity.”² That covers school districts, districts of innovation, open-enrollment charter schools, other charter entities, regional education service centers, and shared services arrangements.³

The reach is wide. TEA groups those covered into three categories: all teachers and administrators, all school employees, and all service providers.¹ Substitute teachers, bus drivers, custodial staff, cafeteria workers, and outside contractors who provide services to a campus all fall under one of those headings. If you’ll be working inside or for a Texas public school in any role, plan on completing the form.

What the Affidavit Asks You to Disclose

The form has five disclosure questions, each answered yes or no, and the statute requires honest and complete responses to all of them.² They cover:

Whether you have ever been investigated by law enforcement or child protective services, or been charged with, adjudicated for, or convicted of certain offenses, primarily those involving sexual or abusive conduct toward minors or students.
Whether any licensing authority, in Texas or another state, has investigated you or denied, suspended, revoked, or otherwise sanctioned a license, certificate, or permit for similar misconduct.
Whether you have ever been placed on Texas’s Do Not Hire Registry.
Whether you are currently employed by, or have previously worked for, a public or private school, or acted as a service provider for one.
Whether you have ever been terminated, discharged, or resigned from a public or private school to avoid termination.

The affidavit also includes a consent for release of employment records, authorizing the hiring entity to contact your previous employers.² You’ll also fill in standard identifying information: your full legal name, address, and contact details.

How to Complete the Form

Download the official TEA form. It’s available as a PDF from TEA’s pre-employment affidavit page, and many districts also embed it in their online application portals.¹ Fill in your personal information at the top, then work through each disclosure question.

If you answer “Yes” to any question, checking the box is not enough. The statute requires you to write out all relevant facts you know about the matter, including whether the allegation was ultimately found to be true or false.² Be thorough. A clear, factual narrative gives the district something to work with; vague or incomplete answers create problems that a full explanation would have avoided.

Notarized Affidavit or Unsworn Declaration

The form comes in two versions, and the hiring entity chooses which one you use. One is a traditional notarized affidavit; the other is an unsworn declaration that requires no notary.¹ Ask the district’s HR office which one they want before you look for a notary.

If a notary is required, you’ll sign in front of a commissioned notary public, who will verify your identity with a government-issued photo ID, administer the oath, and complete the jurat with their seal, signature, and date. Texas caps the notary fee for administering an oath at $10.⁴ Banks, shipping stores, and many district administrative offices offer notary services. Texas also authorizes online notarizations by two-way video and audio under Government Code Chapter 406, so you can complete the notarized version remotely.⁵

If the district accepts an unsworn declaration, you sign and date it without a notary. An unsworn declaration made under Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code Chapter 132 carries the same legal weight as a sworn statement, and lying on one still constitutes perjury.

Where to Submit It

Submit the completed affidavit to the human resources department of the educational entity that is hiring you. Most districts accept it as part of the application packet, uploaded through the online portal or hand-delivered. If the district used the notarized version and wants an original with a raised seal, ask whether they’ll take a scanned copy or need the physical document mailed. There is no fee for the affidavit itself beyond any notary charge you paid.

What a “Yes” Answer Means

Answering “Yes” does not automatically disqualify you. The statute states that a person is not barred from employment based on a disclosed allegation if the hiring entity determines, from the information in the affidavit, that the allegation was false.² That’s one reason the written explanation matters. A thorough, honest account of an unfounded allegation gives the district what it needs to clear you.

Where the disclosed facts involve a confirmed conviction or substantiated misconduct, the district will weigh those facts in its hiring decision. Placement on the Do Not Hire Registry is a firmer barrier, because the registry exists to prevent individuals with certain histories from working in schools.

Penalties for Lying or Leaving Something Out

Concealing information on the affidavit has consequences on more than one level. Under the Education Code, failing to disclose required information is a Class B misdemeanor, and the statute makes non-disclosure grounds for mandatory termination: the educational entity “shall discharge or refuse to hire” anyone found to have omitted required information.²

An administrator who knowingly hires someone despite knowing the person lied on the affidavit can lose their own educator certification. The State Board for Educator Certification has authority to revoke an administrator’s certificate in that situation.²

The Texas Penal Code applies separately to false statements on sworn documents. Perjury, meaning a false statement under oath or in an unsworn declaration, is a Class A misdemeanor punishable by up to one year in jail, a fine of up to $4,000, or both.⁶⁷ If the false statement is material and made during or in connection with an official proceeding, the charge escalates to aggravated perjury, a third-degree felony carrying two to ten years in prison and a fine of up to $10,000.⁸⁹

If You’re Coming From Another State

The affidavit still applies. The disclosure questions ask about investigations, charges, and licensing actions in any state, not just Texas.² You must disclose a licensing sanction imposed by another state, even if that state handled the matter differently than Texas would have.

Texas hiring entities also have access to the NASDTEC Educator Identification Clearinghouse, a national database that collects disciplinary actions against educator certificates reported by all fifty states, the District of Columbia, and several other jurisdictions.¹⁰ A report in the Clearinghouse doesn’t automatically block you from being hired in Texas, but it gives the hiring entity a way to verify what you disclosed, or catch what you didn’t. Omitting an out-of-state action that appears in a Clearinghouse search puts you in the mandatory-termination territory described above.

If you later move between Texas districts, the disclosure history follows you: you’ll complete a new affidavit for each hiring entity, since every educational entity is independently responsible for collecting the form from every applicant.

1
Texas Education Agency. Pre-Employment Affidavit for Educators
2
State of Texas. Texas Education Code 22A.055 – Pre-Employment or Pre-Service Affidavit
3
State of Texas. Texas Education Code 22A.001 – Definitions
4
Texas Secretary of State. Notary Public Educational Information
5
Texas Secretary of State. Online Notary Public Educational Information
6
State of Texas. Texas Penal Code 37.02 – Perjury
7
State of Texas. Texas Penal Code 12.21 – Class A Misdemeanor
8
State of Texas. Texas Penal Code 37.03 – Aggravated Perjury
9
State of Texas. Texas Penal Code 12.34 – Third Degree Felony
10
NASDTEC. NASDTEC Clearinghouse