Texas's workforce registry is the Texas Early Childhood Professional Development System (TECPDS), found at public.tecpds.org, which also houses the Texas Trainer Registry.
The federal CCDF rule does not require individual staff to join a registry, and whether Texas licensing rules require membership was not something our research could confirm.
This page covers what TECPDS is, who registers, how a profile is created, and what the record unlocks in Texas.
What is the Texas Early Childhood Professional Development System?
The Texas Early Childhood Professional Development System — TECPDS — serves as Texas's early childhood workforce registry, and it is reached at public.tecpds.org.
The same system also houses the Texas Trainer Registry.
When the Texas Workforce Commission's child care strategic plan refers to "the Workforce Registry," it is naming this system: the plan describes a Texas Rising Star points measure that acknowledges staff who participate in the Workforce Registry, which is TECPDS.
TECPDS appears on the Council for Professional Recognition's October 2026 list of NWRA-approved state workforce registries.
That matters later, because the Council accepts workforce registry transcripts from all U.S. state and territory workforce registries as part of the CDA credentialing process.
The federal frame comes from the Child Care and Development Fund rules at 45 CFR 98.44: each state must describe a training and professional development framework that addresses workforce information, and workforce registries are how most states track it.
TECPDS is Texas's version of that tracking.
One navigation note: the texasearlychildhood.org address did not resolve when we checked on October 5, 2026, so tecpds.org is the address to use today.
How registries work everywhere else — who is required to join, what they record, how ladder levels feed pay programs — is in our guide to workforce registries.
Who has to register in Texas?
Start with the federal answer, because it is the easy one: the CCDF rule does not require individual staff to join a registry.
Whether membership is mandatory is decided by each state's licensing rules.
The Texas answer is the one our research could not close.
We could not confirm a Texas licensing rule requiring TECPDS membership — the check of the state's rules came back unverified, and the texasearlychildhood.org domain did not resolve when we ran it on October 5, 2026.
Unconfirmed is not the same as exempt, so treat the question as open rather than settled in either direction.
What is documented is the incentive side.
Since September 2024, the Texas Workforce Commission's Texas Rising Star — the state's quality rating and improvement system — has included a points-based measure that acknowledges staff who participate in the Workforce Registry (Texas Early Childhood Professional Development System, TECPDS).
So even without a confirmed mandate, staff registry participation is something the Texas Rising Star points measure recognizes.
The Texas membership requirement is unconfirmed
How to create a TECPDS profile
The pages our research read do not document TECPDS's current sign-up screens, so we won't walk you through fields and buttons that may have changed.
The system is reached at public.tecpds.org, and its own site is the authority for the current steps.
What you can usefully do before you start is assemble what a registry record is made of: your education transcripts, the certificates from completed training, and any credentials you hold.
A profile built from documents you can produce is one a director or a credentialing body can act on; a profile built from memory is not.
If a director asks you to register as part of onboarding, ask which contact details they want on file, so the ID your center keeps matches the one you use.
And if you already hold a profile from another state's registry, keep it — the section below covers where that record still counts.
Career levels and what they unlock
Our research did not document a Texas career-ladder scale inside TECPDS, so we won't name levels that may not match the current system.
TECPDS's own materials are the source for whether and how it assigns levels today.
What the research does document for Texas is the unlock we already mentioned: since September 2024, Texas Rising Star's points-based measure acknowledges staff who participate in the Workforce Registry.
Registry participation is an input the Texas Rising Star points measure recognizes — which is a reason your profile has value to an employer even before it holds a level.
Nationally, registry levels do real work in specific states: pay supplements, scholarships and quality-rating programs in the states our workforce registries guide documents read a member's level or membership as an eligibility input.
Texas is not one of the documented supplement examples — its documented tie-in is the Texas Rising Star points measure.
Recording training hours
The practical point of the record is the transcript.
The Council for Professional Recognition — the body that awards the CDA — accepts workforce registry transcripts from all U.S. state and territory workforce registries as part of the CDA credentialing process, and TECPDS is on the Council's list of approved state registries.
One record, kept current, documents your training for a national credential.
Know the limit, though: registry membership does not satisfy the CDA renewal membership requirement.
Renewal calls for current membership in an early childhood professional organization — a registry is not one.
Texas licensing also sets training hours for center caregivers, separate from anything a registry records.
The hour totals and the rest of the stack live on our training hours guide and our Texas teacher requirements page.
How a specific workshop or college course gets into a TECPDS record was not documented in the pages we read — confirm with TECPDS before you count on a course appearing there.
Using your registry ID when job hunting
In Texas, the concrete employer reason is Texas Rising Star: since September 2024, the points-based measure acknowledges staff who participate in the Workforce Registry.
A director whose program participates in Texas Rising Star has a reason to track staff registry participation, so the question can come up in onboarding paperwork — and if you already have a profile, put the ID on your application rather than waiting to be asked.
The record also travels.
For a CDA application, the Council accepts transcripts from all U.S. state and territory workforce registries, so a profile you built in a previous state still documents your training after you move to Texas — even if you never re-create it in TECPDS.
Once your profile is live, say so where employers look: a line on your resume with your registry status saves a director a follow-up email.
Current openings are on our childcare teacher jobs page.
Career and employer information, not licensing or legal advice — registry requirements sit in state licensing rules, so confirm the current rule with the Texas Health and Human Services Commission's Child Care Regulation department.