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House Bill 548 |
House Author: Canales |
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Effective: 9-1-19 |
Senate Sponsor: Lucio et al. |
House Bill 548 amends the Education Code to require the commissioner of education and the executive commissioner of the Health and Human Services Commission (HHSC) jointly to ensure that the language acquisition of each child eight years of age or younger who is deaf or hard of hearing is regularly assessed using a tool or assessment determined by experts in deaf education to be valid and reliable. The bill provides for a certain memorandum of understanding between the commissioner of education, the executive commissioner of HHSC, and the Educational Resource Center on Deafness at the Texas School for the Deaf and establishes a joint annual reporting requirement for the Texas Education Agency (TEA), the HHSC division for early childhood intervention services, and the center. Implementation of these provisions by TEA and HHSC is mandatory only if a specific appropriation is made for that purpose.
House Bill 548 includes certain information regarding school nonattendance and truancy as part of the information each public school district and open-enrollment charter school is required to report through the Public Education Information Management System.