By Moreno of Harris                                   H.B. No. 3192
         Line and page numbers may not match official copy.
         Bill not drafted by TLC or Senate E&E.
                                A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
 1-1                                   AN ACT
 1-2     relating to the provision of private community-based dropout
 1-3     recovery education programs to provide alternative education
 1-4     programs for students at risk of dropping out of school.
 1-5           BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
 1-6           SECTION 1.  Subchapter C, Chapter 29, Education Code, is
 1-7     amended by adding Section 29.081(e) to read as follows:
 1-8           (e)  A school district may use a private or public
 1-9     community-based dropout recovery education program to provide
1-10     alternative education programs for students at risk of dropping out
1-11     of school.  A school district, when utilizing a community-based
1-12     dropout recovery education program, shall develop goals,
1-13     objectives, and guidelines that best address the needs of students
1-14     at risk of dropping out of school.  These guidelines shall include,
1-15     but need not be limited to, grading students' work, offering course
1-16     credit, curriculum development and implementation, modifying
1-17     instructional time requirements, performance standards,
1-18     qualifications of staff and faculty, class size, student-faculty
1-19     ratios and methods of evaluating subject mastery.  The guidelines
1-20     may, but do not necessarily need to, comply with all the
1-21     requirements of this Code.  [The program must grade students' work,
 2-1     offer course credit, modify instructional time requirements, and
 2-2     establish methods of evaluation subject mastery.]
 2-3           SECTION 2.  This Act takes effect September 1, 1999.
 2-4           SECTION 3.  The importance of this legislation and the
 2-5     crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
 2-6     emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
 2-7     constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
 2-8     days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended.