The House Public Education Committee will meet at 8 a.m., Tuesday, March 30, to hear testimony on the following bills:
HB 3270 Dutton
The companion bill to SB 1365 (Bettencourt) heard March 25 in the Senate Education Committee, HB 3270 would make commissioner decisions, orders, or determinations final and unappealable and prohibits local funds from being used to initiate or maintain any action or proceeding against the state arising from such a decision. The bill also makes several changes to special investigations TEA may conduct of districts. The bill allows the commissioner to grant a district or campus an accountability rating of “not rated” if the school is subject to a declaration of a state disaster. SB 1365 also allows the commissioner to appoint a board of managers to a district if a campus has had a conservator assigned to it for two consecutive years.
HB 256 Cortez
Would require school district employment policy to include anti-bullying measures to address bullying in the workplace, including provisions to address bullying of a teacher by a parent.
HB 332 Talarico
Would add costs associated with implementing social and emotional learning programs to the costs that can be paid using a district’s compensatory education allotment.
HB 437 Goodwin | et al.
Would require at least one-half credit in personal financial literacy as part of the foundation high school curriculum. It would also reduce required elective credits from five to four and one-half. The bill would apply to students entering ninth grade during the 2021-2022 or later school year.
HB 538 Patterson
Would remove restrictions on funding and payment of costs for full-time online educational programs that were operating on January 1, 2013.
HB 1068 Allen
Would allow a school district employee with available personal leave to use the leave for compensation for a day designated as a school holiday for which the employee would otherwise not receive compensation.
HB 1133 Clardy
Would allow certain counties to hold an election to revoke a county equalization tax it has imposed.
HB 1468 Bell, Keith
Would make changes to curriculum and eligibility requirements for the provision of local remote learning to qualify for state funding and calculation of average daily attendance to facilitate the provision of online instruction to district students.
HB 1496 VanDeaver
Would require school districts to include in mandated reports any management fees paid to or received by the district under certain cooperative purchasing contracts.
HB 2230 Bucy
Would call for a study on incorporating fine arts into the foundation curriculum for public schools.
HB 2344 Zwiener
Would allow the non-multiple choice portion of a state reading assessment instrument or an English I or English II end-of-course assessment to be used as part of a classroom portfolio method to assess writing performance. The commissioner shall adopt rules to allow that portion of the assessment instrument to be scored by a classroom teacher assigned to the same campus as the student to whom the assessment instrument is administered.
HB 2605 Rosenthal
Would create new requirements around student athlete cardiac health guidelines, calling for training to be created by TEA and mandatory removal of students suffering certain symptoms from athletic practices and games until a cardiac assessment can be performed by a healthcare professional and the student cleared for activity.
HB 3129 Huberty | et al.
Would allow a school district to transport any student who is enrolled in the district, regardless where the student lives, and would not require an interlocal agreement to do so.
HB 3204 Dutton
Relates to the methods to achieve a college, career, or military outcomes bonus under the Foundation School Program.
HB 3346 Meza
Would create a state accountability indicator of achievement for improving student preparedness for success in subsequent grade levels other than performance on assessment instruments for public elementary, middle school, and junior high campuses and districts.
HB 3528 Sanford
Would expand the grade levels that can be served by the TxVSN down to kindergarten. Also expands the parent notification required yearly about the TxVSN to be all parents K-12. Bill begins in the 2021-22 school year.
HB 3557 King, Ken
Would allow parents and guardians to elect for a student to repeat or retake a course or grade or enter prekindergarten or kindergarten if they were eligible to enter that grade the previous year.
HB 3591 Jetton
Would create a high-speed Internet access grant program to provide high-speed broadband access to districts and charters to facilitate student instruction.
HB 3643 King, Ken
Would create the Texas Commission on Virtual Education comprised of 13 members equally appointed by the governor, lieutenant governor, speaker and includes one member of the SBOE. The commission must develop recommendations to address issues related to the delivery of and funding for virtual education, including alternative instructional delivery methods and alternative methods of funding. The commission would need to make a report by December 31, 2022, to the governor and the legislature.
HB 3731 Dutton
Would provide some specificity in state law by substituting references such as “unacceptable rating” or “acceptable rating” with actual letter grades from the state accountability system for both district and charter sanctions available to the commissioner. The bill would include D-rated schools in the “unacceptable rating” group, as opposed to just F-rated schools as is current practice.
Use TASA’s Bill Tracker to learn more about education-related bills filed in the 87th session.
