Volume 43 | June 10, 2022

Coalition news & updates

Hello All,


Thank you to everyone who was able to join the school safety feedback meetings to share thoughts and propose legislative ideas on the growing conversations around school safety in response to the tragedy in Uvalde. Proposed additions to our legislative topics addressing school safety will be sent out to everyone soon for coalition approval. 


Yesterday, the Governor directed the Texas Education Agency to create a Chief of School Safety and Security.  You can find that directive here


Below you will see an update interim hearing schedule and recent news articles on educational policy stories from across the country. 


All my best,


Julia

Upcoming Interim Hearings and SBOE Meeting Agenda 


You can find all House hearing live streams here and all Senate live streams here.


I'll continue to update this list as well as include a brief summary of past hearings each week:


  1. Senate Finance - June 28th, 10am - Agenda - The Committee will examine local use of federal relief funding, including funding provided to school districts through the Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) Fund.
  2. House Public Education - July 25th - no official agenda posted yet, but the committee has confirmed this date will be a reschedule of the hearing that adjourned early last month. BCEC will have two opportunities to provide invited testimony - one on CTE funding and another on chronic absenteeism. 
  3. House Public Education - July 26th - no official agenda posted yet, but the committee has reported they will cover the following topics: 1- Identify and examine efforts to ensure parents have a meaningful role in their children's education; 2- Examine partnerships between K-12, higher education institutions, and employers that promote postsecondary and career readiness and identify current obstacles that public schools, higher education institutions, and employers face; 3- Monitor and analyze the state policy on curriculum and instructional materials used in public schools


In addition to the above interim hearings, The State Board of Education will be meeting next week on June 14 - 17th. In addition to approving new charter schools (including "Spelligent" which will be located in San Antonio), the SBOE will approve or reject SBEC recommendation to implement edTPA. You can find the full SBOE agenda here

 

Interim Hearing Summaries

I have one summary to share:


House Committee on Pensions, Investments & Financial Services - 06/06/22 - Included in the summary is just the committee conversation on HB 1444 as I know it is a topic of concern for many of you who had self-funded and Active care programs in the past. 


The Rob Elementary Shooting, Investigative Committee - 06/09/22 - The Committee met and gave introductions on the purpose of the committee and immediately went into executive session. They met for a total of five hours, came back into public session to announce they would meet next week as well, and adjourned. 


You can find all of the summaries in the Interim Hearing Summaries Folder found here.


If you'd like these emailed directly to you, let me know and I can email them as attachments.


I tried to keep the summaries as short(ish) to be as pertinent to BCEC topics as possible. Please let me know if you have any questions.

What we are reading

Texas Republicans want to arm more school employees, but few districts are opting in


Texas teachers worry about school shootings, which may determine whether they return


Texas politicians search for solutions after another mass shooting. Experts say we’ve already found them.


Families of trans children sue to halt Texas child-abuse policy


Analysis: History suggests attention on gun policy will fade well before the November elections


Texas legislator proposes ban on minors watching drag shows


The Lone Star State enters the Musk-Twitter fray, highlighting Texas’ willingness, and Republicans in general, to break with traditional free market thinking.




AHISD, EISD, ECISD, FSHISD, HISD, JISD, LISD, MVISD, NEISD, NISD, RFISD, SAISD, SCUCISD, SISD, SISD, SWISD

We are here to help:



Julia

210-279-2787

Julia@BCECTX.org


Charles

940-768-8594

Charlesluke43@gmail.com