BILL ANALYSIS

H.B. 2748

By: Martinez Fischer

Public Education

Committee Report (Unamended)

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE

The Grants for Student Clubs program provides grants to school districts to fund student club activities for students at risk of dropping out of school. For a club to be eligible for a grant, it must be in a district or campus that, during each of the three preceding school years, exhibited characteristics that strongly correlate with high dropout rates. Interested parties assert that the Texas Education Agency has interpreted this to mean that a club must be in a district or campus where at least 70 percent of the students enrolled were identified as economically disadvantaged in each of the preceding three school years. Given limited resources and Texas' ongoing dropout problem, H.B. 2748 seeks to alter the eligibility criteria to direct these limited resources to a more specific subset of Texas schools and students.

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.

ANALYSIS

H.B. 2748 amends the Education Code to authorize the commissioner of education to award a grant in an amount not to exceed $5,000 in a school year to a school district on behalf of a student club at a district high school campus with a student population at least 50 percent of which are students at risk of dropping out of school, rather than on behalf of a student club at a district high school campus that exhibited during each of the three preceding school years characteristics that strongly correlate with high dropout rates. The bill makes a conforming change.

EFFECTIVE DATE

On passage, or, if the bill does not receive the necessary vote, September 1, 2011.