BILL ANALYSIS

C.S.H.B. 1891

By: Stucky

Higher Education

Committee Report (Substituted)

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE

Concerns have been raised regarding potentially duplicitous testing requirements for those pursuing high school equivalency. There have been calls to allow students who have achieved certain scores on a high school equivalency exam to bypass additional testing currently required to enter a technical school, community college, or university. C.S.H.B. 1891 seeks to heed these calls by providing for exemptions from certain testing requirements under the Texas Success Initiative. 

CRIMINAL JUSTICE IMPACT

It is the committee's opinion that this bill does not expressly create a criminal offense, increase the punishment for an existing criminal offense or category of offenses, or change the eligibility of a person for community supervision, parole, or mandatory supervision.

RULEMAKING AUTHORITY

It is the committee's opinion that rulemaking authority is expressly granted to the commissioner of higher education in SECTION 1 of this bill.

ANALYSIS

C.S.H.B. 1891 amends the Education Code to exempt a student who has achieved a score set by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board on a high school equivalency examination from testing requirements under the Texas Success Initiative. The bill requires the commissioner of higher education by rule to establish the period for which an exemption under the bill's provisions is valid. The bill applies beginning with the assessment of entering undergraduate students at public institutions of higher education for the 2020 fall semester.

EFFECTIVE DATE

September 1, 2019.

COMPARISON OF ORIGINAL AND SUBSTITUTE

While C.S.H.B. 1891 may differ from the original in minor or nonsubstantive ways, the following summarizes the substantial differences between the introduced and committee substitute versions of the bill.

The substitute does not include specifications relating to a student's performance on a high school equivalency examination with respect only to certain content areas to qualify for the exemption. The substitute changes the bill's effective date and the semester on which the bill's provisions begin to apply.