Senate Bill 568 | Effective: See below |
Senate Author: Bettencourt et al. | Senate Committee: Education K-16 |
House Sponsor: Buckley | House Committee: Public Education |
Senate Bill 568 amends the Education Code to revise and set out provisions relating to special education in public schools, including funding for special education under the foundation school program. Among other provisions, the bill does the following:
- provides for the ability of a student who is enrolled in a special education program to earn the distinguished level of achievement;
- replaces requirements for the Texas Education Agency (TEA) to develop a statewide design and plan for the delivery of services to children with disabilities with a requirement for TEA to develop a comprehensive system to ensure statewide and local compliance with federal and state law related to special education;
- requires the board of trustees of a public school district or the governing body of an open‑enrollment charter school, at least once each year, to include during a public meeting a discussion of the performance of students receiving special education services;
- revises the eligibility criteria for participation in a special education program;
- provides for the development and distribution to applicable parents of information regarding educational residential placement options for children who may qualify for placement in a state supported living center;
- revises and sets out provisions relating to contracts for the provision of services to students with disabilities in a residential or day placement program, including requirements regarding oversight of such contracts by the commissioner of education;
- revises provisions relating to funding for noneducational community‑based support services to provide for the operation of a grant program for the provision of such services to students who are placed in a residential program or are placed in a day placement program and at risk of being placed in a residential program;
- renames the supplemental special education services program as the parent‑directed special education services program and makes certain other changes regarding that program, including requiring TEA to maintain an online application system, requiring use of a waitlist if more acceptable applications are received than available funding, and requiring the commissioner to award a grant to each eligible applicant who applied but was not accepted for the 2024‑2025 school year; and
- revises provisions relating to students with visual impairments, who are deaf or hard of hearing, or who are deaf‑blind, including by providing for the consolidation of statewide plans for the education of such students and revising requirements for data collection and reporting regarding the language acquisition of certain children who are deaf or hard of hearing.
Effective September 1, 2025, the bill does the following:
- increases the special education transportation reimbursement rate and the college, career, or military readiness outcomes bonus for students receiving special education services;
- establishes a special education full individual and initial evaluation allotment;
- provides allotment funding for qualifying day placement programs or cooperatives and establishes an allotment for regional day school programs for the deaf as a replacement for the existing method of allocating appropriated funds for such programs based on the number of weighted full‑time equivalent students served; and
- makes discretionary the provision of grants for video surveillance of special education settings using excess foundation school program funds.
Furthermore, the bill does the following effective September 1, 2026:
- revises provisions relating to the special education allotment to provide for the transition from a placement‑based funding model to a service intensity‑based model and, with respect to extended school year services, to provide for funding at the highest tier of intensity for which the student qualifies and remove the 75 percent funding limit and the $10 million statewide cap;
- establishes a new special education service group allotment;
- provides for special education transition funding for the 2026‑2027 school year;
- revises the eligibility criteria for the allotment for a student with dyslexia or a related disorder and removes a cap on the amount of the allotment that may be used to contract with a private provider to provide supplemental academic services to the student;
- replaces a reference to a mainstream instructional arrangement with a reference to a general education setting in provisions relating to the basic allotment; and
- requires reporting through PEIMS of information regarding students enrolled in a special education program as necessary for TEA to perform general supervision activities and determine allotment funding.
Except as otherwise provided, the bill takes effect June 20, 2025.