JLM C.S.H.B. 816 75(R) BILL ANALYSIS PUBLIC EDUCATION C.S.H.B. 816 By: Ehrhardt 5-6-97 Committee Report (Substituted) BACKGROUND Section 11.251 of the Education Code provides that the board of trustees of each individual school district shall adopt a policy to establish a district- and campus-level planning and decision-making process that provides for a site-based decision-making committee. This committee is to be made up of the professional staff of the district, parents, and community members to establish and review the district's and campuses' educational plans, goals, performance objectives, and major classroom instructional programs. Section 7.056 of the Code includes a provision which requires that any school campus or district seeking a waiver of a requirement, restriction, or prohibition imposed by the Education Code or rule of the school board or commissioner must submit a written application to the commissioner. That application must include, in part, written comments from this campus- or district- level sitebased decision-making committee. However, this provision does nothing to verify that the members of the committees actually reviewed the waiver before it was submitted with comments. Under current law, it is possible for the application to include written comments without the majority of the committee having seen the waiver. Under current practice, if a district submits the application, the district-level committee is supposed to review the application. If the campus submits the application, the campus-level committee reviews the application. PURPOSE This bill requires the chairperson of the committee to sign the application for waiver. This signature is evidence that a majority of the members of the committee have reviewed the application. This will ensure that the majority of members have actually seen the waiver application and, therefore, had an opportunity to comment on it. This bill makes a change as to which committee an application must be reviewed by. If an application is submitted by a campus, the campus-level committee of that campus will review the application and submit comments. If the district submits the application, the district-level committee and the campus-level committees of those campuses affected by the application must review the waiver and submit comments. This will ensure that all campuses effected by a waiver are able to review and comment on the application. RULEMAKING AUTHORITY It is the committee's opinion that this bill does not expressly grant any additional rulemaking authority to a state officer, department, agency or institution. SECTION BY SECTION ANALYSIS Section 1 Amends Section 7.056 of the Education Code (b)(2)adds that in addition to written comments by the committee, the signature of the chairperson of the committee is required on the application. This signature is evidence that the majority of the members of that committee have been given the application to review. The written comments and signature of the chairperson are to come from the appropriate committee as established under subsections (A) and (B) of this subsection. (b)(2)(A)adds that in the case that a district applies for a waiver, the chairperson from the district-level committee and the chairpersons from each campus-level committee effected by the waiver are to sign and comment on the application as provided in (b)(2). (b)(2)(B)adds that in the case a campus applies for a waiver, only the chairperson of the campus-level committee of the campus submitting the waiver must sign and comment on the application. Section 2 Effective date. Section 3 Emergency Clause. COMPARISON OF ORIGINAL TO SUBSTITUTE In the substitute, the majority of the committee members no longer need to sign the waiver application signifying receipt. Instead, the chairperson of the committee is the only individual who is required to sign the application. This bill requires that before the chairperson signs the applications, he or she must give the majority of committee members the opportunity to review the application. This is done by putting into law that the chairperson's signature is evidence that the majority of the committee members have reviewed the application. The substitute also clarifies a change made to the law in the introduced version regarding which committee an application must go to, a district- or campus-level committee. The substitute clarifies that if an application is submitted by a district-level committee, that application must go to both the district-level committee and any campus-level committee of a campus that is affected by the application. If the application is submitted by the campus, the application must go to only the campus-level committee of that campus submitting the application.