Sunday, February 25, 2018

General Assembly Session 2/22/18




Today VSBA staff attended the full committee meeting of Senate Education and Health. There was a large docket of bills and many that were of interest to VSBA:

HB 2 (Bell, Richard P.) – This bill would require the Board of Education to provide for teacher licensure by reciprocity for a period of one year for any spouse of an active duty member of the Armed Forces of the United States or the Commonwealth, provided that such spouse has obtained a valid out-of-state license, with full credentials and without deficiencies, that is in force at the time the application for such a one-year reciprocal license is received by the Department of Education. The bill would provide that any such individual who receives a satisfactory evaluation at the conclusion of the year of employment under such one-year reciprocal license is eligible for a renewable license. VSBA supports the bill. The committee reported the bill (14-0).

HB 45 (Filler-Corn) This bill would require any family life education curriculum offered in any elementary school, middle school, or high school to incorporate age-appropriate elements of effective and evidence-based programs on the importance of the personal privacy and personal boundaries of other individuals and tools for a student to use to ensure that he respects the personal privacy and personal boundaries of other individuals. The committee reported the bill (13-1).

HB 50 (Hope)This bill would require each local school board to adopt policies that (i) prohibit school board employees from requiring a student who cannot pay for a meal at school or who owes a school meal debt to do chores or other work to pay for such meals or wear a wristband or hand stamp and (ii) require school board employees to direct any communication relating to a school meal debt to the student's parent, which may be made by a letter addressed to the parent to be sent home with the student. The committee reported the bill (15-0).

HB 80 (Krizek) This bill would require the Board of Education, in its regulations providing for teacher licensure by reciprocity, to permit applicants to submit third-party employment verification forms. VSBA supports this bill. The committee reported the bill (15-0).

HB 84 (Bell, Richard P.) This bill would require any local school board that does not offer any elective course in American Sign Language to (i) grant academic credit for successful completion of an American Sign Language course offered by a comprehensive community college or a multidivision online provider approved by the Board on the same basis as the successful completion of a foreign language course and (ii) count completion of any such American Sign Language course toward the fulfillment of any foreign language requirement for graduation. The committee reported the bill (14-0).

HB 215 (Knight) – This bill would declare eligible for a renewable one-year license to teach in public high schools in the Commonwealth any individual who has (i) received a graduate degree from a regionally accredited institution of higher education; (ii) completed at least 30 credit hours of teaching experience as an instructor at a regionally accredited institution of higher education; (iii) received qualifying scores on the professional teacher's assessments prescribed by the Board, including the communication and literacy assessment and the content-area assessment for the endorsement sought and (iv) completed certain other licensure requirements. VSBA supports this bill. The committee reported the bill (15-0).

HB 231 (Hope)This bill would clarify that in a county with the county manager plan of government (Arlington County), the county may have an elected school board notwithstanding the default method of school board appointment as set out in the Code. VSBA supports this bill. The committee reported the bill (15-0).

HB 330 (Yancey)This bill would permit any public elementary or secondary school student to possess and use unscented topical sunscreen in its original packaging on a school bus, on school property, or at a school-sponsored event without a note or prescription from a licensed health care professional if the topical sunscreen is approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for nonprescription use for the purpose of limiting damage to skin caused by exposure to ultraviolet light. The bill contains an emergency clause. The committee carried the bill over to 2019 (8-6).

HB 438 (Bulova)This bill would require the Board of Education to adopt regulations that prohibit any school board or any individual who is an employee, contractor, or agent of such school board from assisting another employee, contractor, or agent in obtaining a new job if such school board or individual knows or has probable cause to believe that such other employee, contractor, or agent engaged in sexual misconduct regarding a minor or student. The committee reported the bill (14-0).

HB 544 (Freitas)This bill would permit each local school board to (i) establish High School to Work Partnerships (Partnerships) between public high schools and local businesses to create opportunities for high school students to (a) participate in an apprenticeship, internship, or job shadow program in a variety of trades and skilled labor positions or (b) tour local businesses and meet with owners and employees or (ii) delegate the authority to establish Partnerships to the local school division's career and technical education administrator or his designee, in collaboration with the guidance counselor office of each public high school in the school division. The bill requires such local school boards to educate high school students about opportunities available through such Partnerships. The bill would also require the Board of Education, the Department of Labor and Industry, and the State Board for Community Colleges to identify Partnerships that may be eligible for exemptions from certain federal and state labor laws and regulations and establish procedures by which such exemptions may be obtained for such Partnerships. VSBA supports the bill. The committee reported the bill (14-0).

HB 670 (Kilgore)This bill would permit any local school board that governs a school division (i) in which the locality is designated as fiscally at-risk or fiscally distressed by the Appalachian Regional Commission in the most recent fiscal year or is determined to have above-average fiscal stress or high fiscal stress by the Virginia Commission on Local Government in its most recent "Report on the Comparative Revenue Capacity, Revenue Effort, and Fiscal Stress of Virginia Counties and Cities" and (ii) for which the composite index of local ability to pay is less than or equal to 0.2000 to expend up to 25 percent of the required local effort for basic aid for debt service on school building capital renovation or construction projects. The bill would provide that in the event that the school division no longer meets such criteria, the local school board shall develop and implement a plan to readjust expenditures of the required local effort for basic aid over the course of no more than four fiscal years. The bill also provides that in the event that a school division that no longer met such criteria and that developed such plan subsequently meets the criteria again, the local school board may seek the approval of the Superintendent of Public Instruction to amend such plan. The bill has an expiration date of July 1, 2030. The committee reported and rereferred the bill to Senate Finance (15-0).

HB 676 (Pogge)This bill would declare it the goal of the Commonwealth that each child who is deaf or hard of hearing is (i) as linguistically ready for kindergarten as his peers who are not deaf or hard of hearing and (ii) receptively and expressively literate in English and literate in written English by the end of third grade. The bill would require each agency of the Commonwealth that is responsible for providing services to children who are deaf or hard of hearing to collaborate to provide unified and seamless services for each such child from the onset of the Early Hearing Detection and Intervention process through the end of his elementary and secondary school career. The bill would also establish a 14-member Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing Children's Advisory Subcommittee within the Disability Commission to advise the Commission on the provision of services in the Commonwealth for children who are deaf or hard of hearing. The committee carried the bill over to 2019 (15-0).

HB 810 (O'Quinn) The bill would require any school bus operator applicant who does not possess an commercial driver's license to receive (i) a minimum of 24 hours of classroom training and (ii) six hours of behind-the-wheel training on a school bus that contains no pupil passengers and requires any school bus operator applicant who possesses a commercial driver's license to receive (a) a minimum of four hours of classroom training and (b) three hours of behind-the-wheel training on a school bus that contains no pupil passengers. Current law leaves the setting of such hourly requirements to the Department of Education. The bill contains technical amendments. The VSBA supports this bill. The committee reported the bill (15-0).

HB 1000 (Gilbert)This bill would permit any school board to employ any individual who was employed by a school board as of December 17, 2015, and who (i) has been convicted of a felony, with the exception of certain enumerated felonies, and (ii) has been granted a simple pardon by the Governor and has had his rights restored by the Governor. The committee reported the bill with a substitute (conforming to Peake’s bill) (13-1).

HB 1085 (Yancey)This bill would require any local school board of a school division in which a military installation or other military housing is located to establish and implement policies to provide for the enrollment to any school of any military student residing on a military installation or in military housing within the school division, upon the request of his parent. The bill would permit such policies to include certain conditions. The bill would require a copy of such policies to be posted on the division's website and to be available to the public upon request. The committee reported the bill (15-0).

HB 1156 (Wilt) This bill would require the Board of Education, in its regulations governing licensure, to provide for licensure of teachers with an endorsement in dual language instruction pre-kindergarten through grade six. The bill would define "dual language instruction" as instruction in English and in a second language. The bill would require the Board, in establishing the requirements for such endorsement, to require, at minimum, coursework in dual language education; bilingual literacy development; methods of second language acquisition; theories of second language acquisition; instructional strategies for classroom management for the elementary classroom; and content-based curriculum, instruction, and assessment. The bill would provide that (i) each teacher with such an endorsement is exempt from the Virginia Communication and Literacy Assessment requirement but is subject to the subject matter-specific professional teacher's assessment requirements and (ii) no teacher with such an endorsement is required to obtain an additional endorsement in early/primary education pre-kindergarten through grade three or elementary education pre-kindergarten through grade six in order to teach in pre-kindergarten through grade six. VSBA supports the bill. The committee reported the bill (15-0).

HB 1419 (Delaney)This bill would require local school boards to provide (i) a minimum of 680 hours of instructional time to students in elementary, except for students in half-day kindergarten, in the four academic disciplines of English, mathematics, science, and history and social science and (ii) a minimum of 375 hours of instructional time to students in half-day kindergarten in the four academic disciplines of English, mathematics, science, and history and social science. The bill would authorize local school boards to include and require the Board of Education to accept, elementary school, unstructured recreational time that is intended to develop teamwork, social skills, and overall physical fitness in any calculation of total instructional time or teaching hours. The committee conformed the bill to match SB 273 (Petersen). The committee reported the bill (15-0).

HB 1485 (Filler-Corn)This bill would make several changes to the procedures relating to interventions when a pupil fails to report to school for a total of five scheduled school days for the school year, no indication has been received by school personnel that the pupil's parent is aware of and supports the pupil's absence, and a reasonable effort to notify the parent has failed, including (i) removing the appointed attendance officer as a party to the plan to resolve such nonattendance, (ii) permitting but not requiring the attendance officer to participate in the conference necessitated by additional absences subsequent to the development of the plan, and (iii) permitting but not requiring the attendance officer to file a complaint with the juvenile and domestic relations court alleging the pupil is a child in need of supervision or to institute criminal proceedings against the parent pursuant to relevant law. Under current law, the attendance officer is required to participate in such conference and is also required to file such complaint and institute such proceedings in cases in which the pupil is absent for an additional school day without indication that the pupil's parent is aware of and supports the pupil's absence. The committee reported the bill (14-0).

HB 1504 (Cline)This bill would require enrollment in the Virtual Virginia online learning program during the school year to be open, on a space-available basis, to each public high school student in the Commonwealth and each high school student in the Commonwealth who receives home instruction. VSBA opposed this bill as originally written and approached the patron with amended language. The committee amended the bill to address enrollment and reported and rereferred to Senate Finance (15-0).

HB 1600 (Bourne)This bill would reduce the maximum length of a long-term suspension from 364 calendar days to 45 school days. The bill would permit a long-term suspension to extend beyond a 45-school-day period but would prohibit such a suspension from exceeding 364 calendar days if (i) the school board or division superintendent or his designee finds that aggravating circumstances exist, as defined by the local school board in a written policy, or (ii) the long-term suspension is preceded by another long-term suspension in the same school year. VSBA supported the bill as amended. The committee reported the bill (13-1).


 x
x