Bill Text: MO HB1295 | 2010 | Regular Session | Introduced
Bill Title: Requires school districts to establish special programs or services for students who are identified as academically gifted
Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Democrat 1-0)
Status: (Introduced - Dead) 2010-05-14 - Referred: Elementary and Secondary Education (H) [HB1295 Detail]
Download: Missouri-2010-HB1295-Introduced.html
SECOND REGULAR SESSION
95TH GENERAL ASSEMBLY
INTRODUCED BY REPRESENTATIVES LAMPE (Sponsor), ROORDA, McNEIL, WALTON GRAY, WEBB, NORR, LOW AND SCHIEFFER (Co-sponsors).
3691L.01I D. ADAM CRUMBLISS, Chief Clerk
AN ACT
To repeal sections 160.522 and 162.720, RSMo, and to enact in lieu thereof two new sections relating to gifted education.
Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the state of Missouri, as follows:
Section A. Sections 160.522 and 162.720, RSMo, are repealed and two new sections enacted in lieu thereof, to be known as sections 160.522 and 162.720, to read as follows:
160.522. 1. The department of elementary and secondary education shall produce or cause to be produced, at least annually, a school accountability report card for each public school district, each public school building in a school district, and each charter school in the state. The report card shall be designed to satisfy state and federal requirements for the disclosure of statistics about students, staff, finances, academic achievement, and other indicators. The purpose of the report card shall be to provide educational statistics and accountability information for parents, taxpayers, school personnel, legislators, and the print and broadcast news media in a standardized, easily accessible form.
2. The department of elementary and secondary education shall develop a standard form for the school accountability report card. The information reported shall include, but not be limited to, the district's most recent accreditation rating, enrollment, rates of pupil attendance, high school dropout rate and graduation rate, the number and rate of suspensions of ten days or longer and expulsions of pupils, the district ratio of students to administrators and students to classroom teachers, the average years of experience of professional staff and advanced degrees earned, student achievement as measured through the assessment system developed pursuant to section 160.518, student scores on the ACT, along with the percentage of graduates taking the test, average teachers' and administrators' salaries compared to the state averages, average per pupil current expenditures for the district as a whole and by attendance center as reported to the department of elementary and secondary education, the adjusted tax rate of the district, assessed valuation of the district, percent of the district operating budget received from state, federal, and local sources, the percent of students eligible for free or reduced-price lunch, data on the percent of students continuing their education in postsecondary programs, [and] information about the job placement rate for students who complete district vocational education programs, whether the school district currently has a state-approved gifted education program, and if the school has had a state-approved gifted program within the last three years.
3. The report card shall permit the disclosure of data on a school-by-school basis, but the reporting shall not be personally identifiable to any student or education professional in the state.
4. The report card shall identify each school or attendance center that has been identified as a priority school under sections 160.720 and 161.092, RSMo. The report also shall identify attendance centers that have been categorized under federal law as needing improvement or requiring specific school improvement strategies.
5. The report card shall not limit or discourage other methods of public reporting and accountability by local school districts. Districts shall provide information included in the report card to parents, community members, the print and broadcast news media, and legislators by December first annually or as soon thereafter as the information is available to the district, giving preference to methods that incorporate the reporting into substantive official communications such as student report cards. The school district shall provide a printed copy of the district-level or school-level report card to any patron upon request and shall make reasonable efforts to supply businesses such as, but not limited to, real estate and employment firms with copies or other information about the reports so that parents and businesses from outside the district who may be contemplating relocation have access.
162.720. 1. [Where a sufficient number of children are determined to be gifted and their development requires programs or services beyond the level of those ordinarily provided in regular public school programs, districts may establish special programs for such gifted children.
2.] Each school district shall identify which of the district's students are academically gifted as established under the rules prescribed by the department of elementary and secondary education. The department shall develop a list of identification criteria with emphasis on early identification.
2. Each school district shall establish appropriate programs or differentiated services for students who are identified as academically gifted under subsection 1 of this section and whose educational needs require programs or services beyond what is provided in the regular public school program.
3. The state board of education shall determine standards for such programs or services. Approval of such programs or services shall be made by the state department of elementary and secondary education based upon [project] applications submitted [by July fifteenth of each year] in a format and at a time established by the department. Each school district shall report annually to the department, by a date established by the department on the programs or services provided to academically gifted students.
4. Gifted programs and services shall be funded by the district from its basic state aid, except as further provided in this subsection:
(1) A district that formerly received categorical gifted funds may determine an appropriate amount of funding by referring to its last year of such categorical funding; and
(2) A district that did not provide a state-approved program or services previously may determine an appropriate amount of funding within its increases in basic state aid since fiscal year 2006.
The districts described in subdivisions (1) and (2) of this subsection and a district receiving a payment under subsection 2 of section 163.031 that did not have such programs or services may use local funding to support such programs or services.
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