HBA-MPM H.B. 3192 76(R) BILL ANALYSIS Office of House Bill AnalysisH.B. 3192 By: Moreno, Joe Public Education 4/21/1999 Introduced BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE Long the world's leader in producing high school graduates, the U.S. has relinquished that position to 11 other industrialized countries, according to a new study from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. While U.S. students are staying in school longer than they had previously, other countries have made even greater strides. In 1990, the average number of years a five-year-old American was expected to attend school or college was 16.3, a figure which by 1996 had risen to 16.8 years, but by 1996, 11 other countries, including Canada, Spain and Finland, had surpassed that number. While college enrollment in the U.S. remained relatively stable between 1990 and 1996, it increased by more than 25 percent in 16 OECD countries. The U.S. has one of the highest university dropout rates in the industrialized world -- 37 percent. Among the 29 member nations of the OECD, the U.S. high school graduation rate, at 72 percent, is next to last, surpassing only Mexico. The study also reported Americans are among the industrialized world's least literate populations. Yet U.S. spending per pupil is among the highest in the group at all levels of education. H.B. 3192 requires a school district, when utilizing a community-based dropout recovery education program, to develop goals, objectives, and guidelines that best address the needs of students at risk of dropping out of school RULEMAKING AUTHORITY It is the opinion of the Office of House Bill Analysis that this bill does not expressly delegate any additional rulemaking authority to a state officer, department, agency, or institution. SECTION BY SECTION ANALYSIS SECTION 1. Amends Subchapter C, Chapter 29, Education Code, by amending Section 29.081(e), as follows: (e) Requires a school district, when utilizing a community-based dropout recovery education program, to develop goals, objectives, and guidelines that best address the needs of students at risk of dropping out of school. Requires these guidelines to include, but not be limited to: _grading students' work, _offering course credit, _curriculum development and implementation. _modifying instructional time requirements, _performance standards, _staff and faculty qualifications, _class size, _student-faculty ratios, and _methods of evaluating subject mastery. Provides that the guidelines may, but are not required to, comply with all requirements of this code. Deletes text requiring the program to attain certain objectives, which are incorporated into the guidelines of the proposed text. SECTION 2. Effective date: September 1, 1999. SECTION 3. Emergency clause.