BILL ANALYSIS
Senate Research Center S.B. 1569
AUTHOR'S / SPONSOR'S STATEMENT OF INTENT
The top 10 percent rule, enacted by the 75th Legislature, 1997, provides for automatic admission to the state's public colleges and universities for an applicant who graduated with a grade point average in the top 10 percent of the applicant's high school graduating class in one of the two school years preceding the academic year for which the applicant is applying for admission. In 2006, 4,902 of 6,864, or 71 percent, of all freshmen enrolled at The University of Texas at Austin were admitted under the top 10 percent rule. Admissions at Texas A&M University and especially at The University of Texas at Austin are increasingly being controlled by the top 10 percent rule.
As proposed, S.B. 1569 authorizes the governing board of a university system to adopt a policy which treats an application to one or more general academic teaching institutions as an application for admission to any such institution of the university system.
RULEMAKING AUTHORITY
SECTION BY SECTION ANALYSIS
SECTION 1. Amends Section 51.803, Education Code, by amending Subsection (a) and adding Subsections (c) and (d), as follows:
(a) Makes a conforming change.
(c) Authorizes the governing board of a university system (system) that includes more than one general academic teaching institution (institution) to adopt a policy under which an application for admission under this section (Automatic Admission: All Institutions) to one or more institutions by a person eligible for automatic admission under Subsection (a) (regarding automatic admission for students with a grade point average in the top 10 percent of the student's high school graduating class) is treated as an application for admission as an undergraduate student to any institution in the system. Requires a system that adopts a policy under this subsection to offer an eligible applicant admission to at least one component institution of the system. Requires a policy adopted under this subsection to include a process through which the system requests each eligible applicant to list in order of preference the institutions in the system to which the applicant prefers to be admitted under this section. Requires a policy adopted under this subsection to require the system to make a reasonable effort to offer the applicant admission to the institution of the applicant's highest preference possible consistent with the enrollment needs of the system.
(d) Requires a system that adopts a policy under Subsection (c) to provide to the board of trustees of each school district in the state reasonable notice of the policy not later than November 1st of the academic year immediately preceding each academic year to which the policy applies.
SECTION 2. Effective date: upon passage or September 1, 2007.