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F I S C A L I M P A C T R E P O R T

SPONSOR Nava

ORIGINAL DATE

LAST UPDATED

02/04/08

HB

SHORT TITLE Community Service Learning Opportunities

SB 324

ANALYST Escudero

APPROPRIATION (dollars in thousands)

Appropriation

Recurring

or Non-Rec

Fund

Affected

FY08

FY09

$250.0

Recurring

General Fund

(Parenthesis ( ) Indicate Expenditure Decreases)

Relates To: SB 329

SOURCES OF INFORMATION

LFC Files

Responses Received From

Public Education Department (PED)

SUMMARY

Synopsis of Bill

Senate Bill 324 appropriates $250.0 to the Public Education Department (PED) to support a

service-learning regional center network statewide. The purpose of the regional center network

is to support teachers and community educators in incorporating community service learning into

a standards-based education system by providing coordinated training, technical assistance and

project support.

FISCAL IMPLICATIONS

The appropriation of $250.0 contained in this bill is a recurring expense to the general fund. Any

unexpended or unencumbered balance remaining at the end of FY09 shall revert to the general

fund.

The PED would be the fiscal agent for these funds and would be responsible for developing a

Request for Proposal (RFP) and review and establish the contract and monitor the

implementation of the funds. (See Administrative Implications below)

Senate Bill 324 – Page

2

SIGNIFICANT ISSUES

According to PED, this legislation is requesting funding to support a regional center network

statewide that would support teachers and community educators in incorporating community

service-learning into a standards-based education by providing coordinated training, technical

assistance and project support.

New Mexico has supported service-learning since the middle 1990’s with federal grant monies

applied for through the Public Education Department and since 2003, service learning has

received a total of $410,000 through direct legislative appropriations or allocations made by the

PED from the Teacher Professional Development Fund.

This request for funding would begin to formulate a state directive for service-learning that

would use the knowledge and work of these past years and apply them to provide coordinated

training, technical assistance and project support statewide in a coordinated fashion to ensure a

consistent program and delivery of services.

The need for this legislation is further supported by the 2007 SJM 51 report that was submitted

to the Legislative Education Study Committee on January 14, 2008. In the report the issues

identified within service-learning that hamper it from being a fully viable are concerns such as

multiple definitions of service-learning, how to equitably award academic credit to high schools

students, how to align community activities in an equitable manner, etc. Through the regional

center approach these issues and concerns would be addressed and statewide consistency would

be an outcome.

PERFORMANCE IMPLICATIONS

There is no specific PED performance measure related to this legislation. However, this bill

does support the on-going PED funding through the professional development fund to better

serve schools and districts in the area of service-learning

ADMINISTRATIVE IMPLICATIONS

There are implications for administrative impact to the PED with this legislation. The PED

would need to develop a RFP, following all of the state guidelines for procurement of these

services, follow up with the contractor on implementation, and meet timelines associated with

the legislation. The costs of this work to PED could be: 80 hours of Ed Adm A @$25.50 for a

total of $2,652; monitoring of project activities 1,000 miles at .32 per mile is $320; and 4 days

per diem @ $85 per day for a total of $340. Total of PED costs: $3,312.00.

PME/mt