|
House Bill 3646 |
House Author: Hochberg et al. |
|
Effective: See below |
Senate Sponsor: Shapiro et al. |
House Bill 3646 amends Education Code provisions relating to public school finance. Excluding enrichment funding, the bill entitles an open-enrollment charter school to the greater of the funding per student in weighted average daily attendance (WADA) that it would have received during the 2009-2010 school year under the school finance formulas as they existed on January 1, 2009, plus an additional amount of $120 per WADA, or the statewide average funding per WADA. In addition to the above funding, a charter school is entitled to enrichment funding based on the state average tax effort.
House Bill 3646 requires each school district, open-enrollment charter school, and the Windham School District to raise the salary of each teacher and each full-time speech pathologist, librarian, certified counselor, and nurse for the 2009-2010 and 2010-2011 school years by the greater of $80 per month or each employee's share of $60 per WADA in 2009-2010, factoring increased costs for social security and retirement. This increase is in addition to any increases an individual would have received under the district's 2008-2009 salary schedule or in addition to the salary the charter school or the Windham School District would have paid the employee. The salary increase is contingent on a determination by the commissioner of education that it is an allowable use of federal funds received under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 and appropriated under the Foundation School Program. The bill requires a local awards plan under the educator excellence program to notify eligible teachers and principals of the specific criteria and any formulas on which the awards will be based before the start of the period on which the awards will be based, eliminates existing stipends for teachers with postgraduate degrees, and repeals the awards for student achievement program.
House Bill 3646 establishes a special education grant program to make grants available to assist eligible districts in covering the cost of educating students with disabilities. Eligibility is based on a demonstrated lack of sufficient funds to serve such students, and grant recipients must serve such students in the least restrictive environment appropriate to meet their needs.
House Bill 3646 establishes priorities for the commissioner with respect to applications for funding for extended year programs and requires the commissioner to give preference to certain districts in the distribution of funds for the life skills program for student parents and for school guidance and counseling programs. The bill removes a provision that restricted flexible school day programs to students in grades 9 through 12, expands the scope of such programs to students who will be denied class credits for failure to meet all attendance requirements, and authorizes the commissioner to limit program funding for such a student's attendance to only the attendance necessary for the student to earn class credit that the student would not receive without retaking the class. The bill restricts the subsidy for a certification examination to a student who passes a certification examination qualifying the student for employment in a current or emerging high-demand, high-wage, high-skill job as determined by the commissioner of education, the commissioner of higher education, and the Texas Workforce Commission.
House Bill 3646 increases from 25 to 100 the cap on the number of districts that the Texas Education Agency (TEA) may select to participate in the financial literacy pilot program and requires TEA to report to the legislature on the program's implementation and effectiveness not later than January 1, 2011. The bill also adds assisting districts in providing instruction in personal financial literacy to the regional education service centers' core services.
House Bill 3646 requires TEA, rather than an electronic course provider, to pay the costs of evaluating and approving electronic courses for the state virtual school network (VSN) and, if TEA does not have sufficient funds to pay such costs for all of the courses submitted for evaluation and approval, to give priority to paying the costs of evaluating and approving courses that meet certain criteria, but it allows the course provider to pay such costs to ensure that the evaluation occurs. The bill requires the commissioner of education to establish procedures for verifying a teacher's completion of the professional development courses required for teaching a VSN course and to establish qualifications and professional development requirements applicable to college instructors teaching dual credit courses through the VSN, and it authorizes alternative educator professional development courses provided by a district or open-enrollment charter school for teachers seeking authorization to teach a VSN course. A district or charter school is entitled to federal, state, and local funding for a student in grades three through eight enrolled in a full-time VSN course program equal to the amount it otherwise would receive for a student in the district or school, and a district or charter school may charge a fee for enrollment in a VSN course provided during the summer. A district or charter school that is not the provider may charge a district or charter school student a nominal fee if the student enrolls in a VSN course that exceeds the normal course load for students in the equivalent grade level.
House Bill 3646 entitles a school district or open-enrollment charter school that provides a VSN course a VSN allotment of $400 for each student completing a VSN course that satisfies a graduation requirement as part of the normal course load, and it entitles the district or charter school in which the student is enrolled to a VSN allotment of $80 as reimbursement for administrative costs. The amount of a VSN allotment for a student completing a course that exceeds the normal workload is based on the funding appropriated for that purpose; the commissioner may set aside up to 50 percent of those funds to pay the cost of providing VSN courses for students to recover academic credit for courses in which they were previously unsuccessful and may reserve a portion of the set-aside funds to pay for VSN courses for students in alternative education settings. A VSN allotment is contingent on a student's completion of the entire course. The bill requires TEA to evaluate whether providers of different types of VSN courses should be compensated differently based on course types, to investigate the feasibility of making language acquisition courses available through the VSN, to investigate the feasibility of creating a series of VSN courses focusing on the educational needs of students in alternative education settings, and to report to the legislature on each of these studies not later than January 1, 2011.
House Bill 3646 sets the equalized wealth level for a district's maintenance and operations (M&O) tax effort up to the state compression percentage to correspond to the basic allotment or $4,765 per pupil for each penny of tax effort up to the district's compressed tax rate.
A district may include a student attending a dual credit course taught by a college or university in its average daily attendance (ADA); effective September 1, 2011, the law reverts to its previous state. The bill requires the commissioner of education and the commissioner of higher education to conduct a study of dual credit programs and courses, focusing on the costs to the state, school district, community college, and student, and to make recommendations on related matters to the legislature.
Excluding enrichment revenue, House Bill 3646 limits annual increases in a district's M&O tax revenue per WADA to not more than $350. For the 2009-2010 through 2012-2013 school years, the bill sets the basic allotment at the greater of $4,765 or 1.65 percent of the statewide average property value per weighted student and thereafter, at the lesser of $4,765 or that amount multiplied by the quotient of the district's compressed tax rate divided by the state maximum compressed tax rate. The bill increases the indirect cost allotment set by State Board of Education (SBOE) rule from 15 to 45 percent of the compensatory education allotment. The bill entitles a district to an allotment of $650 for each student in ADA who has a parent or guardian on active duty in a combat zone in the U.S. military or who transferred into the district as a result of the parent's or guardian's relocation in a base closure or realignment, and to an allotment of $50 for each student in ADA enrolled in two or more advanced career and technology courses totaling three or more credits or in an advanced course as part of a tech-prep program. The bill adds the existing $275 high school allotment to the Tier 1 allotments, entitles a district that is required to reduce its wealth per student to the equalized wealth level to a credit in the amount of the allotment, and entitles a district not otherwise eligible for state aid under Tier 1 to this allotment. The bill also provides each district, including the South Texas Independent School District, with a minimum increase of $120 per WADA above what it would have received for the 2009-2010 school year under the previous school finance formulas. The bill repeals hold harmless provisions for the 1997 increase in the homestead exemption, the 1999 salary schedule increase, and 2001 employee insurance benefits and repeals the exclusion of property wealthy districts from the small and mid-sized district adjustment. The bill creates a 15-member select committee to review the public school finance weights, allotments, and adjustments, sets forth its composition, meeting requirements, and additional duties, and requires the committee to issue a report not later than December 1, 2010.
House Bill 3646 allows a district to adopt a budget after adopting a tax rate for the tax year in which the fiscal year covered by the budget begins if it adopts the tax rate before receiving the certified appraisal roll for the district; a district that adopts a tax rate before adopting the budget must hold a public hearing on the proposed tax rate followed by another public hearing on the proposed budget rather than holding a single hearing on the two items.
House Bill 3646 requires each district to adopt a policy governing expenditures of local funds from vending machines, rentals, gate receipts, or other local revenue sources over which it has direct control and sets forth requirements for such a policy.
House Bill 3646 allows the SBOE to reserve a percentage of the cost value of the permanent school fund (PSF) from use in guaranteeing school district bonds, and it allows a district and a local college or university to contract for the district to contribute toward the costs of an instructional facility, stadium, or other athletic facility owned or controlled by the college or university if the contract authorizes the district’s use of the facility.
House Bill 3646 establishes an intercept program, backed by Foundation School Program (FSP) appropriations other than specific school district appropriations, to provide credit enhancement for district bonds if a district's application for a PSF bond guarantee is rejected. The bill authorizes the commissioner of education to establish an open-enrollment charter school facilities credit enhancement program, and to allocate up to one percent of FSP appropriations for this purpose, to assist charter holders in obtaining financing for real property and facilities acquisitions and improvements; but it prohibits the program's implementation unless private matching funds are committed to the program for at least the first 10 years of the term of obligations for which credit enhancement is provided. The bill establishes a permanent roll-forward of the instructional facilities allotment.
House Bill 3646 amends the Election Code, Government Code, Insurance Code, and Tax Code to make conforming changes, and amends the Transportation Code to require a district to comply with school bus seat belt requirements only to the extent TEA pays or commits to pay the district for expenses incurred in compliance. Effective June 19, 2009, if for the preceding tax year a district adopted an M&O tax rate that was less than its effective M&O rate for that preceding tax year, the bill amends the Tax Code to provide for calculation of a district's rollback tax for the current year as if the district had adopted an M&O tax rate for the preceding tax year equal to its effective M&O tax rate for that preceding tax year.
Except as noted above, the bill's provisions take effect September 1, 2009, but provisions relating to grants for special education take effect only if a specific appropriation for the implementation of those provisions is provided in a general appropriations act of the 81st Legislature.