AN ACT CONCERNING EDUCATION GRANTS.

This bill revises state per-student grants for interdistrict magnet schools and the Open Choice public school attendance program for FY 10 and FY 11. It also increases transportation grants for interdistrict magnet school operators who transport students to schools from outside the district where the schools are located.

Starting in FY 10, the bill restores the pre-July 1, 2008 minimum budget requirement (MBR) for districts receiving increases in annual Education Cost Sharing (ECS) grants. Under the bill, districts must use 100% of any increase for education and may not use an ECS grant increase to supplant local education funding.

The bill also (1) repeals a reduction in ECS student counts for students attending full-time interdistrict magnet schools and (2) sets the amount of the required state holdback of ECS funds for a district with low student achievement at (a) either 20% of any annual ECS grant increase the district receives or (b) the same dollar amount held back in the previous year, whichever is greater.

Finally, the bill requires that charter school teachers who qualify for membership in the Teachers' Retirement System (TRS) participate in, and make contributions to, TRS.

EFFECTIVE DATE: July 1, 2009, except for the provision repealing the law scheduled to take effect July 1, 2009, which is effective on passage.

For purposes of establishing per-student operating grants for interdistrict magnet schools, current law and this bill divide magnet schools into the two categories: (1) schools that are required to help the state meet the 2008 Sheff v. O'Neill desegregation stipulated agreement and court order (“Sheff magnets”), and (2) schools that are not required for the Sheff order (“non-Sheff magnets”). Within these categories are magnet schools operated by the local or regional board of education for the district where the school is located (“host magnets”), and magnet schools operated by regional education service centers (“RESC magnets”).

The bill eliminates scheduled increases in non-Sheff magnet school per-student operating grants for FY 10 and FY 11 and maintains future grants at FY 09 levels as follows:

1. for host magnets, $ 3,000 for each student from the host district and $ 6,730 for each out-of-district student;

2. with one exception (see # 3), for RESC magnets enrolling 55% or more of their students from a single town, $ 6,730 for each student from a non-dominant town and $ 3,000 for each student from the dominant town;

3. for a RESC magnet that began operating in the 1998-99 school year and that, for the 2008-09 school year, enrolled 70% or fewer of its students from a single town, $ 6,730 for each student from a non-dominant town and $ 4,835 for each student from the dominant town (this provision applies to the Wintergreen Magnet School in Hamden); and

4. for RESC magnets enrolling less than 55% of their students from a single town, $ 7,620 per-student.

For FY 10 and FY 11, the bill increases per-student grants for interdistrict magnet schools that help the state meet the Sheff desegregation order.

Under current law, Sheff magnets operated by RESCs that enroll less than 60% of their students from Hartford are scheduled to receive state per-student grants of $ 8,180 for FY 10 and $ 8,741 for FY 11. The bill increases these grants to $ 10,443 per student for each of the fiscal years.

Under current law, Sheff magnets operated by host districts or by RESCs that enroll 60% or more of their students from Hartford are scheduled to receive (1) for each student from outside Hartford, $ 7,440 for FY 10 and $ 8,180 for FY 11 and (2) for each Hartford student, $ 3,000. The bill increases the grant for each non-Hartford student to $ 13,054 for FY 10 and FY 11 and eliminates the grant for Hartford students. It applies only to magnet schools located in the Sheff region (see BACKGROUND).

The bill eliminates a provision, applicable only for FY 09, reducing each town's student count for purposes of ECS grants by 25% of the number of the town's students attending full-time interdistrict magnet schools and for whom the state paid a magnet school operating grant.

By law, the state pays an annual $ 2,500 per-student grant to school districts that enroll students from outside the district under the state's Open Choice interdistrict school attendance program (“receiving districts”). Under this bill, if the state's appropriation in any year for these grants exceeds the amounts distributed for the $ 2,500 per-student grants, the education commissioner must distribute the excess funds to receiving districts in proportion to the number of additional out-of-district students they enroll over the number they enrolled for the 2008-09 school year (see COMMENT).

Under current law, if a district is in the third year or more of failing to make adequate yearly progress in math or reading, 20% of any ECS grant increase it receives for the year is held back for the education commissioner to spend on the district's behalf. This bill sets the hold-back amount at the greater of 20% of the district's ECS grant increase or the same dollar amount withheld in the previous year.

The bill requires charter school teachers who hold state teaching certificates or State Board of Education permits and meet other TRS membership requirements to participate in, and make contributions to, TRS. Under current law, charter school teachers' participation in TRS is voluntary.

The bill increases state grants to entities operating interdistrict magnet schools for transporting students outside their home districts to the magnet schools. Under current law, the maximum transportation grant is $ 1,300 per student. The bill increases it to $ 2,500 per-student for FY 10 and $ 3,000 per-student for FY 11.

Starting with FY 10, the bill restores a requirement that a district spend 100% of any ECS increase it receives for education. For FYs 08 and 09, districts were required to spend from 15% to 65% of their ECS increases on education (MBR), with districts in need of improvement required to spend an additional 20%. Except for FY 08 and FY 09, the law bars districts from using ECS grant increases to supplant local funds for education. Thus, under the bill, if, in FY 10 or after, a town receives an increase in its ECS grant over the prior year, its budgeted appropriation for education must be at least the amount it appropriated for education in the prior year plus 100% of the increase.

The bill repeals a provision, scheduled to take effect on July 1, 2009, that would have increased the MBR percentages to 50% to 80% of any ECS increases, or 70% to 100% for low-achieving districts.

Under the 2008 Sheff stipulation and order, the Sheff region towns are: Avon, Bloomfield, Canton, East Granby, East Hartford, East Windsor, Ellington, Farmington, Glastonbury, Granby, Hartford, Manchester, Newington, Rocky Hill, Simsbury, South Windsor, Suffield, Vernon, West Hartford, Wethersfield, Windsor, and Windsor Locks.

The bill's requirements for distributing excess Open Choice funds is inconsistent with existing requirements, which the bill does not change, for distributing such excess funds. Existing law requires that, if the education commissioner determines as of October 15 of any year that total enrollment in the Open Choice program is below the number for which the state appropriated funds, the excess funds not lapse. Instead, the commissioner must distribute $ 500,000 of the excess funds in bonus payments to receiving districts that enroll 10 or more out-of-district students in the same school. The maximum bonus payment is $ 1,000 per student. Any remaining excess funds must be used for interdistrict cooperative grants (CGS § 10-266a (k)).

Yea

Nay

(04/01/2009)

Yea

Nay

(04/15/2009)