HOUSE BILL 361

54th legislature - STATE OF NEW MEXICO - second session, 2020

INTRODUCED BY

Rebecca Dow and Raymundo Lara and Gabriel Ramos and

Christine Trujillo and G. Andrés Romero

 

 

 

 

AN ACT

RELATING TO PUBLIC SCHOOL FINANCE; CREATING A NEW CULTURAL AND LINGUISTIC RELEVANCE INDEX AND PROGRAM UNITS IN RESPONSE TO THE CONSOLIDATED MARTINEZ AND YAZZIE V. STATE OF NEW MEXICO LAWSUIT; PROVIDING THAT THE CALCULATION OF THE NEW INDEX AND PROGRAM UNITS SHALL BE CALCULATED FOR EACH PUBLIC SCHOOL RATHER THAN SCHOOL DISTRICTS AND BASED ON THE COURT'S FINDINGS OF AT-RISK STUDENTS; PROVIDING THAT THE MONEY GENERATED BY THE PROGRAM UNITS SHALL BE SPENT IN THOSE PUBLIC SCHOOLS THAT GENERATE THE PROGRAM UNITS; CLARIFYING THAT THE CULTURAL AND LINGUISTIC RELEVANCE PROGRAM UNITS ARE IN ADDITION TO SCHOOL DISTRICT AT-RISK PROGRAM UNITS.

 

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF NEW MEXICO:

     SECTION 1. A new section of the Public School Finance Act is enacted to read:

     "[NEW MATERIAL] CULTURAL AND LINGUISTIC RELEVANCE PROGRAM UNITS--CALCULATED PER PUBLIC SCHOOL.--

          A. As used in this section:

                (1) "cultural and linguistic at-risk students" includes students who come from economically disadvantaged homes, students who are English language learners, students who are American Indian or Hispanic and students with a disability who are eligible for class C or D special education services; and

                (2) "services" means research-based or evidence-based academic, social and emotional interventions, such as:

                     (a) culturally relevant curriculum development, including knowledge necessary to support language acquisition and bilingual and multicultural education;

                     (b) culturally and linguistically appropriate instructional materials;

                     (c) specialized professional development for teachers who teach cultural and linguistic at-risk students;

                     (d) tutoring, reading interventions and after-school programs that are delivered by social workers, counselors, teachers or other professional staff;

                     (e) educational programming intended to improve career and college readiness of cultural and linguistic at-risk students, including dual or concurrent enrollment, career and technical education, guidance counseling services and coordination with post-secondary institutions;

                     (f) whole-school interventions, including conversion to community schools; and

                     (g) services to engage and support parents and families in the education of students.

          B. Cultural and linguistic relevance program units shall be calculated for each public school that has cultural and linguistic at-risk students as provided in this section. To qualify for cultural and linguistic relevance program units, a public school is required to have a department-approved educational plan that identifies services to assist cultural and linguistic at-risk students to reach their full academic potential. The public school receiving additional cultural and linguistic relevance program units shall include a report of specified services implemented to improve the academic success of cultural and linguistic at-risk students. The report shall identify the ways in which the public school shall use funding generated through the cultural and linguistic relevance index and the intended outcomes. The number of additional units to which a public school is entitled under this section is computed in the following manner:

Cultural and Linguistic Relevance At-Risk Index x MEM = Units

where MEM is equal to the total public school membership, including early childhood education, if offered at the public school and full-time-equivalent membership of cultural and linguistic at-risk students, and where the cultural and linguistic relevance at-risk index is calculated in the following manner:

Three-Year Average Total Rate x 0.25 = Cultural and Linguistic Relevance At-Risk Index.

          C. To calculate the three-year average total rate, the department shall compute a three-year average of the public school's percentage of membership used to determine its Title 1 allocation, unless the state develops a better indicator of poverty, a three-year average of the percentage of membership classified as English language learners using criteria established by the office for civil rights of the United States department of education, a three-year average of the percentage of membership classified as American Indian or Hispanic and a three-year average of the percentage of membership classified as class C or D special education. The department shall then add the three-year average rates. The number obtained from this calculation is the three-year average total rate.

          D. The department shall recalculate the cultural and linguistic relevance at-risk index and program units for each public school every year.

          E. The money generated by the cultural and linguistic relevance program units shall be used to supplement, not supplant, the general and at-risk funding for public schools that belong to school districts.

          F. Each school district that receives cultural and linguistic relevance program units through the state equalization guarantee distribution shall distribute the money to the public schools that generated it, including locally chartered charter schools, and shall not take an administrative fee for that distribution. Each applicable school district shall verify to the department that it has properly distributed the money provided through these program units as provided in this subsection and that it has not used that money to supplant other funding owed the public schools."

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