Frequently Asked Questions

Civil Service Retirement System (CSRS) INTERIM

Covers employees first hired, rehired or converted to an appointment subject to retirement on or after January 1, 1984. CSRS Interim was a version of CSRS established pending the creation of the new retirement system. When the new system (FERS) was established on January 1, 1987, personnel offices were instructed to review the Official Personnel Folder of all employees covered under CSRS Interim to determine whether or not the employees, by law, were:

• Vested, meaning you had at least 5 years of creditable civilian service under the CSRS. If so, your retirement coverage would be either CSRS or CSRS Offset, or
• If you were not vested in CSRS, you would be covered automatically under FERS.

Civil Service Retirement System (CSRS) OFFSET

CSRS Offset is a version of CSRS established for employees who become subject to Old Age Survivors and Disability Insurance (OASDI), also known as FICA taxes, and have completed at least 5 years of creditable civilian service.

Generally, CSRS Offset coverage applies to employees rehired after a break of more than 365 days with 5 or more years of prior creditable civilian service as of:

• December 31, 1986, or
• As of the date of your last separation and you had at least 1 day of CSRS coverage or Foreign Service Retirement System coverage.
• Employees with at least a 4-day break in service have a 6-month opportunity to transfer to FERS.

Federal Insurance Contributions Act (FICA)

A Federal law that is monitored by the Social Security Administration that requires employees to pay social security tax on their earned income that provides future pension and other social security benefits. The Federal Insurance Contributions Act (FICA) establishes a Social Security and Medicare Tax on employers and employees. The employee's portion of the tax is deducted from the paycheck and then matched by the employer's portion of the tax. The tax applies to:

• Most employees on appointments specifically excluding them from any Federal retirement system coverage. For example, a temporary appointment not to exceed 1 year.
• Most employees first hired in Federal service before January 1, 1984 but were not covered under a Federal retirement system until after December 31, 1983, i.e. temporary employees and,
• Employees rehired after a break in service or break in CSRS coverage (covered service) of more than 365 days, which ended after December 31, 1983.
• Employees first hired on/or after January 1, 1984, with no prior federal employment.
• Employees covered under CSRS Offset and FERS.

Civil Service Retirement System (CSRS)

Covers most employees first hired prior to January 1, 1984.

Employees who have had a break in coverage of less than 1 year (365 days) also retain their CSRS coverage. However, if you have a break in service of at least 4 days, upon rehire you have a 6-month opportunity period to elect to transfer to FERS.

Federal Employees' Retirement System (FERS)

FERS became effective January 1, 1987 and covers most employees first hired on or after January 1, 1984.

Employees rehired after a break in service of more than 365 days with less than 5 years of creditable civilian service.

Employees who elected FERS coverage during transfer opportunities.

FERS is a retirement plan that provides benefits from three different sources: a Basic Benefit Plan, Social Security and the Thrift Savings Plan (TSP). Two of the three parts of FERS (Social Security and the TSP) can go with you to your next job if you leave the Federal Government before retirement. The Basic Benefit and Social Security parts of FERS require you to pay your share each pay period. Your agency withholds the cost of the Basic Benefit and Social Security from your pay as payroll deductions. Your agency pays its part too. Then, after you retire, you receive annuity payments each month for the rest of your life.

The TSP part of FERS is an account that your agency automatically sets up for you. Each pay period your agency deposits into your account amount equal to 1% of the basic pay you earn for the pay period. You can also make your own contributions to your TSP account and your agency will also make a matching contribution. These contributions are tax-deferred. The Thrift Savings Plan is administered by the Federal Retirement Thrift Investment Board.

Both CSRS and FERS retirement benefits are eligible for annual, automatic COLA. Cost-of-living adjustments (COLAs) for the Civil Service Retirement System (CSRS) and the Federal Employees Retirement System (FERS) are based on the rate of inflation as measured by the Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers (CPI-W). COLAs for both CSRS and FERS are determined by the average monthly CPI-W during the third quarter (July to September) of the current calendar year and the third quarter of the base year, which is the last previous year in which a COLA was applied. The “effective date” for COLAs is December, but they first appear in the benefits issued during the following January.

All CSRS retirees and survivors receive COLAs. Under FERS, however, nondisabled retirees under the age of 62 do not receive COLAs. Survivors and disabled retirees are eligible for COLAs under FERS regardless of age. CSRS pays a COLA that is equal to the percentage change in the CPI-W during the measurement period, but COLAs under FERS are limited if the rate of inflation is greater than 2.0%. If the rate of inflation during the measurement period is between 2.0% and 3.0%, the COLA under FERS is 2.0%. If inflation is greater than 3.0%, then the COLA for FERS benefits is equal to the CPI-W minus one percentage point.

Congress passed the first law requiring automatic COLAs for federal civil service retirement benefits in 1962, and it has adjusted either the formula by which they are calculated or the date on which they take effect more than 10 times since then.

The SF 52 and fax must be forwarded to the attention of the Educator Staffing Unit specialist responsible for servicing the district to which the employee is assigned. District procedures may require that the action be routed through the district personnel representative.

 No, the process is rather long and involves coordination with multiple sections within the Personnel Center and with DFAS-Charleston. Reviews begin with the Labor Relations staff. They make the initial determination that the employee may be eligible for conversion. The case file is then forwarded to the Staffing Branch. A staffing specialist may take several hours checking for qualifications, the Mobility Statement, and the NTE scores. If information on file is incomplete, the process will be delayed. The staffing specialist may need to reconstruct where the employee would have gone if the employee were eligible for conversion while at a school that closed. Then the SF52s are coded. If the action is retroactive several years back, there could be as many as 20-30 (or more) SF52s to code. Care must be taken that these actions are coded correctly.

When the Staffing Branch completes the review, analysis, and coding, the action is then forwarded to the Personnel Management Team within the Operations Branch. If you are eligible for retroactive benefits, at this point you will be sent a letter explaining your benefit options. You must respond within 30 days of receipt of this letter indicating which retroactive benefits you are electing. If you are being retroactively reinstated or are being retroactively converted from an intermittent or part-time position to a full-time position, you may also need to provide a statement indicating that you were ready, willing, and able to work during that time and listing your outside earnings, with W-2 forms attached.

Once your election forms and any other necessary documentation are received, the Personnel Management Team will input the SF52s into the automated system and the SF50s will be produced. This process can take anywhere form several hours to several days to complete as every personnel action since the conversion date will need to be canceled and re-input. After all the SF50s are completed, you will be sent copies via your Personnel Center Representative (PCR). The actions and are also sent to the payroll office, DFAS-Charleston, for processing of the benefits and pay. If you are indebted for retroactive benefits, DFAS will send you a letter explaining your repayment options. If you are due money, DFAS will issue you that pay. The calculation and processing of retroactive pay and benefits is a time-consuming and complicated process involving the auditing of years worth of pay history, which is sometimes difficult to reconstruct.

Yes! If you received outside earnings during the covered period due to outside employment, payroll needs a statement from you stating the amount earned and name, address, and telephone number of the company along with a copies of related W-2 forms.

 The payroll database is programmed to cross-reference a pseudo number with an employee's social security number. This means that wages and taxes withheld will be combined and reported under the employee's SSN to the SSA and the IRS. This means the employee will receive only one W-2 form from the Payroll Office for wages and taxes withheld while under their pay jurisdiction.

If you have additional questions, please contact your District Customer Service Representative (CSR), Site Manager, or Personnel Center Representative (PCR).

No, DoDEA does not accept a state issued emergency license. Applicants must hold a current and valid state teaching license without conditional requirements that must be met. In the absence of a state teaching license, DoDEA will accept current Praxis I and II tests meeting acceptable passing scores, with a student teaching internship completed. DoDEA will accept one full year of lead teacher classroom experience in lieu of a student teaching internship. Substitute positions do not qualify as lead teacher experience. This guidance can be found on DoDEA’s website under Teaching Categories and Requirements page.

In the absence of a state teaching license, DoDEA will accept the Praxis I and Praxis II with a student teaching internship in lieu of a state teaching license. The testing codes do change periodically. Please refer to the Teaching Categories and Requirements page for the current testing codes and acceptable scores.

Please visit our website to view our qualification requirements for JROTC instructor .

DoDEA Regulation 5000.9 dated June 25, 2003, Department of Defense Education Activity (DoDEA) Educator Licensure Program.

The process and requirements for DoDEA recertification can be found on DoDEA’s Educator License Renewal (Recertification) page.

The process for requesting a review to add additional teaching categories to your current DoDEA certificate can be found on DoDEA’s Educator License Renewal page, scroll down to the area that states “Additional Teaching Categories” and follow instructions provided.

Current DoDEA educators are to initiate their ASL requests through the school secretary. The school will forward the ASL requests to the District Superintendent Office (DSO) and the DSO will submit the ASL requests to manpower for approval. After approved by manpower, the ASL requests will be submitted to the Civilian Human Recourses Agency (CHRA) for processing.

DoDEA only accepts semester hours and quarter hours from a US Accredited University on an official transcript. A university’s accreditation can be verified by visiting the Database of Accredited Postsecondary Institutions and Programs (DAPIP) website. Unofficial transcripts, grade report, or degree audits are not acceptable documents.

DoDEA strives to staff fully qualified teachers in its schools. Educators are required to maintain a current and valid DoDEA teaching certificate as a condition of their employment. DoDEA continuously reviews approved teaching categories and requirements to ensure that we are keeping up with current trends in the education field to meet the agency’s mission to “Educate, Engage, and Empower military-connected students to succeed in a dynamic world.”

DoDEA issues Provisional and Professional certificates. The Provisional certificate is issued to all newly hired educators and is good for the first two years of their six-year certification cycle. The Professional certificate is then automatically issued to educators who meet the qualification requirements of the position(s) for which hired and have successfully completed 2 years in an educator position with DoDEA.

A maximum of three Project READ credits can be used towards a recertification cycle. Because of the way these courses are designed, DoDEA does not allow them to be used to add new teaching categories to a DoDEA certificate.

Effective January 1, 2006, course work credits earned up to 120 day prior to a DoDEA Educator’s recertification date, AND not used on the current recertification cycle can be used for the next recertification cycle. Hours for a single course cannot be split between two recertification cycles.

Effective March 2019 Licensure no longer grants administrator or above school level endorsements (i.e., Principal, Assistant Principal or ISS Positions) to those not selected and hired for the position. You will have to apply for a position in USA Jobs and compete for the position before we add the endorsements to your DoDEA certificate. All internal and external applicants must apply and get selected/hired for the position of Assistant Principal/Principal before Licensure will grant the corresponding endorsements.

DoDEA teaching certificates can be found online at: https://intranet.ds.dodea.edu/certificates/login.cfm.

1. Open the above link in Internet Explorer or Chrome. The site will not work in Firefox, Safari or Opera.
2. Click the "Login Using CAC " button on the right. Select your current Email certificate (where the issuer is shown as "DOD EMAIL") when prompted and enter your PIN when asked. 
3. Download the PDF and print and/or save the certificate. 

Educators must present a copy of their current and valid Educator Certificate to the school principal/office for retention in the school files.