Schools should apply the statutory definitions when assessing concerns:

• Physical Abuse: physical injury that results in substantial harm, failure to make reasonable effort to prevent physical injury or substantial harm by another person, the use of a controlled substance in a manner or to the extent that results in physical, emotional, or mental injury, causing, permitting, or encouraging a child to use a controlled substance, allowing or failing to make reasonable effort to prevent a child from being trafficked, forcing or coercing a child into marriage.
• Exploitation: the illegal or improper use of a child or their recourses for monetary or personal gain.
• Neglect: the act or failure to act by a person responsible for a child’s care that evidences that persons disregard for the consequences of their act or failure to act and results in the harm of the child or puts the child in immediate danger.
• Sexual Abuse/Exploitation: sexual conduct harmful to the child’s mental, emotional, or physical health, failure to make reasonable effort to prevent sexual conduct harmful to a child, causing or permitting or engaging in the photographing, or filming of a child depicting them in a way that is obscene or pornographic, causing or permitting or engaging in a sexual performance by a child, causing or permitting or engaging in the trafficking of a child.
• Emotional Abuse: mental or emotional injury to a child that can be observed and materially impairs the growth, development, or psychological functioning of the child; causing or permitting a child to be in a situation where mental or emotional injury is sustained.

Best practices include mandated-reporter training for all staff, background checks for employees/volunteers working with minors, internal procedures that prioritize immediate external reporting, supervision policies (minimize one-on-one unsupervised contact), and sharing DFPS hotline/contact information with staff and families. State education/child-welfare partners provide training and materials for districts.

(Source: Texas Constitution and Statutes Family Code 261.001, Child Welfare Information Gateway)

• DFPS annually publishes data and reports on child-maltreatment fatalities, investigations, and system outcomes; the most recent FY 2024 Child Fatality & Near-Fatality report (published Mar 2025) and DFPS monthly data provide state-level statistics and trends used to guide prevention and policy. These reports document hundreds of fatalities/near-fatalities and a large volume of CPS referrals in FY 2024, underscoring high demand on Texas’ child-welfare system.

• Texas operates the statewide Abuse Hotline (1-800-252-5400) and online reporting; DFPS triages reports and coordinates investigations with law enforcement and local CPS staff. Good-faith reporters are immune from civil or criminal liability.

• State discussion (news and policy analysis) continues to emphasize system modernization (data/technology), prevention, and improved responses after high-profile failures — factors that affect how churches and schools interact with DFPS and law enforcement.

(Source: Public Health Context Texas)