BILL ANALYSIS

S.B. 1509

By: Seliger

Public Education

Committee Report (Unamended)

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE

Interested parties note that the P-16 college readiness and success action plan was originally created to decrease the number of students needing developmental education and identify S.B. 1509 as a clean-up bill relating to that plan and, more generally, college readiness and success.

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

S.B. 1509 amends the Education Code to redefine "applied STEM course," as it relates to the requirement that the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board work with institutions of higher education to ensure that credit for an applied science, technology, engineering, or mathematics (STEM) course may be applied to the relevant degree programs offered by Texas institutions of higher education, to include college readiness standards among the recommended high school program's curriculum requirements, the satisfaction of which precipitates the State Board of Education's approval of the applied STEM course. The bill authorizes the term to include a course offered for dual credit.

S.B. 1509 requires the coordinating board, by rule and for purposes of implementing the P-16 college readiness and success strategic action plan and enhancing the success of students at institutions of higher education, to identify, as an alternative to developing, the following programs: higher education bridge programs in specified subject areas to increase student success by reducing the need for developmental education; professional development programs for faculty of institutions of higher education on college readiness standards and the implications of such standards on instruction; and other programs as determined by the coordinating board that support the participation and success goals in the state's master plan for higher education. The bill specifies that, with regard to the latter programs, qualifications and requirements for student participation and institutional or public school eligibility are to be determined by the commissioner of education or the commissioner's designee.

S.B. 1509 decreases from 90 credit hours to 66 credit hours the minimum number of cumulative credit hours required to be successfully completed by a student enrolled in a general academic teaching institution before that credit may be applied to an associate's degree to be awarded by a lower-division institution of higher education previously attended by the student, provided other conditions are met by the student.

S.B. 1509 repeals a provision relating requiring the commissioner and the coordinating board to submit a biennial report describing progress in implementing the P-16 college readiness and success strategic action plan.

S.B. 1509 repeals Section 61.0761(d), Education Code.

EFFECTIVE DATE

September 1, 2013.