1-1     By:  Bivins                                            S.B. No. 520

 1-2           (In the Senate - Filed February 10, 1997; February 13, 1997,

 1-3     read first time and referred to Committee on Education;

 1-4     March 20, 1997, reported favorably by the following vote:  Yeas 11,

 1-5     Nays 0; March 20, 1997, sent to printer.)

 1-6                            A BILL TO BE ENTITLED

 1-7                                   AN ACT

 1-8     relating to eligibility to serve as a public member of the State

 1-9     Board for Educator Certification.

1-10           BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:

1-11           SECTION 1.  Subsection (a), Section 21.033, Education Code,

1-12     is amended to read as follows:

1-13           (a)  The State Board for Educator Certification is composed

1-14     of 15 members.  The commissioner of education shall appoint an

1-15     employee of the agency to represent the commissioner as a nonvoting

1-16     member.  The commissioner of higher education shall appoint an

1-17     employee of the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board to

1-18     represent the commissioner as a nonvoting member.  The governor

1-19     shall appoint a dean of a college of education in this state as a

1-20     nonvoting member.  The remaining 12 members are appointed by the

1-21     governor with the advice and consent of the senate, as follows:

1-22                 (1)  four members must be teachers employed in public

1-23     schools;

1-24                 (2)  two members must be public school administrators;

1-25                 (3)  one member must be a public school counselor; and

1-26                 (4)  five members must be citizens who are not and have

1-27     not, in the five years preceding appointment, been employed by a

1-28     public school district or by an educator preparation program in an

1-29     institution of higher education.

1-30           SECTION 2.  Subdivision (4), Subsection (a), Section 21.033,

1-31     Education Code, as amended by this Act, applies only to a person

1-32     appointed as a public member to the State Board for Educator

1-33     Certification on or after the effective date of this Act.

1-34           SECTION 3.  The importance of this legislation and the

1-35     crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an

1-36     emergency and an imperative public necessity that the

1-37     constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several

1-38     days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,

1-39     and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its

1-40     passage, and it is so enacted.

1-41                                  * * * * *