BILL ANALYSIS

H.B. 1105

By: Cole

Higher Education

Committee Report (Unamended)

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE

The bill author has informed the committee that, while paramedics in many political subdivisions are also firefighters, this is not the case in all political subdivisions, and the bill author further informed the committee that firefighters are eligible to take certain college courses for free under the Firefighters Enrolled in Fire Science Courses program but that paramedics who are not also firefighters are not eligible for these tuition and fee exemptions. H.B. 1105 seeks to address this issue by making paramedics who are not also firefighters eligible for the tuition and fee exemption for certain emergency preparedness classes.

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 Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board in SECTION 1 of this bill.

ANALYSIS

H.B. 1105 amends the Education Code to require the governing board of a public institution of higher education to exempt from the payment of tuition and laboratory fees any student enrolled in one or more courses offered as part of an emergency medical services curriculum who is employed as a paramedic by a political subdivision of the state. The bill authorizes a student who receives the exemption for a semester or term at an institution of higher education to continue to receive the exemption for a subsequent semester or term at any institution only if the student makes satisfactory academic progress toward a degree or certificate at that institution as determined by the institution for financial aid purposes. The bill establishes that the exemption does not apply to the following:

· deposits that may be required in the nature of security for the return or proper care of property loaned for the use of students;

· any amount of additional tuition the institution elects to charge a resident undergraduate student under applicable statutory provisions relating to tuition for repeated or excessive undergraduate hours; or

· any amount of tuition the institution charges a graduate student in excess of the amount of tuition charged to similarly situated graduate students because the student has a number of semester credit hours of doctoral work in excess of the applicable number provided by statutory provisions relating to the formula funding for a doctoral student made by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (THECB).

The bill establishes that the governing board of an institution of higher education is not required to provide a tuition exemption for a course offered exclusively through distance education to a number of students enrolled in the course in excess of 20 percent of the maximum student enrollment designated by the institution for that course.

H.B. 1105 requires the THECB to adopt a uniform listing of degree programs covered by the tuition exemption and to adopt rules as soon as practicable after the bill's effective date governing the granting or denial of an exemption provided under the bill's provisions, including rules that do the following:

· prescribe the educational attainment or level of certification necessary to qualify for an exemption as a paramedic;

· relate to the determination of a student's eligibility for an exemption; and

· relate to the exclusion from the exemption of a distance education course, including prescribing the maximum number of distance education courses that may be excluded from that exemption.

H.B. 1105 applies beginning with tuition and laboratory fees charged for the 2025 fall semester. Tuition and laboratory fees charged for an academic period before that semester are governed by the law in effect immediately before the bill's effective date, and the former law is continued in effect for that purpose.

EFFECTIVE DATE

On passage, or, if the bill does not receive the necessary vote, September 1, 2025.