LEGISLATIVE BUDGET BOARD

Austin, Texas

FISCAL NOTE, 79TH LEGISLATIVE REGULAR SESSION

May 20, 2005

TO:	Honorable Florence Shapiro, Chair, Senate Committee on Education
FROM:	John S. O'Brien, Deputy Director, Legislative Budget Board
IN RE:	HB316 by Grusendorf (Relating to a child's failure to attend school. ), Committee Report 2nd House, Substituted

No significant fiscal implication to the State is anticipated.

The bill would establish high school diploma programs within Job Corps programs operated under contract with the United States Department of Labor.

The bill would authorize a Job Corps high school diploma program to offer a secondary school curriculum, a Texas high school diploma program, and a General Education Development (GED) program.

The bill would require the commissioner to develop and implement an accountability system to assign annual performance ratings to Jobs Corps diploma programs based on factors that must include student performance on secondary exit-level instruments and dropout rates.  For purposes of this estimate, it is assumed that either the alternative accountability system could be adapted for this purpose or that a modified system could be established without significant additional cost to the state.

The bill also relates to a child’s failure to attend school and creates an offense of running away from home.

Section 3 would reduce the number of absences that constitute an offense to seven or more days within a three-month period or three or more days within a four-week period. 
 
Section 4 would require notification by telephone or in writing to a parent of a student that has three unexcused absences during a four-week period.  This section would also require that the parent attend a conference with school officials and that a school or district counselor perform an assessment of the student to develop a plan to improve attendance.
 
Section 5 would require school districts to file a complaint against a student who is absent for seven or more days within a school year or refer the student to juvenile court for conduct indicating a need for supervision (CINS) no later than the 10th day after the date of the student’s last absence. 
 
The bill would take effect September 1, 2005 and would apply to offenses committed on or after that date.

Local Government Impact

No significant fiscal implication to local school districts is anticipated.  Based on student disciplinary data collected by the Texas Education Agency, the number of complaints that school districts would be required to file under the bill would not change significantly from the incidence observed under current law.  The requirement that a counselor assess and develop a plan for each student with three or more unexcused absences within a four-week period and that the parents attend a conference with school officials would not have a significant impact on a statewide basis.  The bill could have an impact on referrals to county juvenile probation departments.

Source Agencies:

701 Central Education Agency, 665 Juvenile Probation Commission

LBB Staff:

JOB, CT, UP, KC, LG