email : Webview : GAE Legislative Alert - Thursday, March 6, 2025

C R O S S O V E R D E A D L I N E
BILLS THAT HAVE PASSED AND ARE ELIGIBLE TO MOVE FORWARD

HB 37 - Would require that local school systems notify employees of all Social Security withholdings and eligibility for other retirement benefits.

HB 38 - Would create a state-funded, needs-based college scholarship program.

HB 81 - "The Interstate Compact for School Psychologists," if enacted, would "facilitate the interstate practice of school psychology in educational or school settings ..." The compact is intended to establish a pathway to allow school psychologists to obtain equivalent licenses to provide school psychological services." The bill passed the House, was referred to the Senate Education Committee and was passed by that committee on March 5.

HB 105 - Would double the permanent disability and death benefits to a public school teacher or school employee injured or killed on the job from $75,000 to $150,000.

HB 127 - Would increase the number of personal days an educator may take from three to five if the individual has sick leave available.

HB 136 - Would expand tax credits for contributions to foster child support organizations.

HB 175 - Proposes to require that "any current or potential director, employee, or other individual affiliated with any program that receives, either directly or indirectly, federal funds through the department for the care of children, including, but not limited to, early care and education programs and Head Start programs" undergo background checks.

HB 200 - Would establish a three-year pilot immersive writing program for eligible public elementary schools.

HB 225 - Would ban red-light and speed detection cameras from school zones.

HB 235 - Would require school systems to provide leaves of absence for their employees for the donation of bone marrow and organs.

HB 267 - Similar to SB 1, limits students to participation on school sports teams that align with their sex as noted on their birth certificate. Both bills have passed the chamber in which they were introduced and will be transmitted to the opposite chamber.

HB 268 - This school safety legislation would provide for reimbursement grants to local school systems that hire qualified "mental health coordinators" and to provide for suicide awareness and prevention programs. By July 1, 2025, the State Board of Education, in collaboration with the Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities, shall establish the essential duties and minimum qualifications for qualified mental health coordinators hired by local school systems.

The bill also requires that records of transferring students with a felony conviction be shared with enrolling local school districts. Such records could be from the Department of Juvenile Justice, the Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities, the Department of Human Services, and the Division of Family and Children Services. Records pertaining to short-term suspensions, a long-term suspensions, or an expulsion from another school shall also be shared with the enrolling school district. Senate Democrats have legislation, SB 54, with a similar provision.

HB 307 - A literacy bill that expands on HB 538, the Georgia Early Literacy Act, which passed in 2022, both sponsored by state Rep. Bethany Ballard, R-Warner Robins. Among other things, the bill proposes additional resources to support reading programs for dyslexic students, and the bill also limits the use of "three cueing" in teaching reading, stating that it could not be the "primary" method utilized. Three-cueing, or MSV, teaches reading by meaning drawn from context or pictures, syntax, and visual information, meaning letters or parts of words.

HB 328 - Would raise the current taxpayer-underwritten tax break for donors to private schools from $120 million to $140 million a year to fund private school vouchers. Passed 98-75.

HB 340 - Would implement a statewide ban on students' use of cell phones during the school day in grades k-8.

HB 651 - Proposes to warn drivers of speed detection and red light cameras by flashing lights and traffic signs that they are entering a school zone that uses them.

SB 1 - Would "require transgender girls and women competing in sports at public schools, high schools, and college student-athletes to play on teams, dress, shower, and use restrooms according to the gender on their birth certificate."

SB 4 - Would require a model code of ethics for local boards of education to be promulgated by the State Board of Education.

SB 17 would require schools to implement alert systems, obtain mapping data, and list requirements for this data. The bill would also give the Georgia Department of Education authority to regulate mapping data.

SB 21 - Could expose school districts to lawsuits if they fail to cooperate with federal immigration officials or the police.

SB 30 - Would outlaw the prescribing or administering certain hormone therapies and puberty-blocking medications to minors.

SB 39 - Would eliminate State Health Benefit Plan coverage for gender-affirming care.

SB 44 - Would revise the definition of the term "qualified local school system" by reducing the minimum required millage rate or effective millage rate from 14 mills to 10 mills to qualify for equalization grants. Similar legislation was passed by the House of Representatives, HB 12.

SB 63 - Each local school system that offers the PSAT/NMSQT, SAT, PreACT, or ACT or an advanced placement exam must make such tests available to home schooled students living in the district. Sponsor state Clint Dixon, R-Gwinnett, said of the bill: "The bill [was filed] because homeschool parents are paying taxes," and that he thinks their neighborhood schools should serve them even if their children are not enrolled." HB 546 is a similar bill in the House.

SB 74 - Proposes to make librarians subject to a crime of a misdemeanor of a high and aggravated nature when knowingly furnishing "harmful" materials to minors. "Harmful to minors" is defined in Georgia law as: "that quality of description or representation, in whatever form, of nudity, sexual conduct, sexual excitement, or sadomasochistic abuse, when it:

(1) Taken as a whole, predominantly appeals to the prurient, shameful, or morbid interest of minors;

(2) Is patently offensive to prevailing standards in the adult community as a whole with respect to what is suitable material for minors; and

(3) Is, when taken as a whole, lacking in serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value for minors."

SB 93 - Passed 50-3. Would eliminate the use of MSV in teaching reading to early-education students.

SB 123 - Concerning school absenteeism. Among other things, the bill would add to Georgia law the following sentence: "No student shall be expelled from a public school in this state due solely to such student's absences from school."

SB 124 - Would expand the taxpayer-funded, private school tuition subsidy bill, which passed last year and which launches later this year. This voucher bill eliminates the one-year residency and local attendance zone requirements to qualify for the voucher for students of active-duty military personnel.

SB 126 - Would add a minimum age requirement to qualify as a dropout and reduce the age for individuals to be eligible for enrollment in "completion special schools."

SB 152 - Expands the voucher law that passed in 2024 by including the biological and adoptive children of parents who have been foster parents in the last ten years.

SB 179 would revise requirements for records that must be provided when a student transfers schools. It would also require a state-wide, anonymous reporting program for dangerous, violent, threatening, harmful, or potentially harmful activity that occurs on or is threatened to occur on school property.

Next Legislative Update: Monday, March 10