House Bill 270

AN ACT TO AMEND SECTION 37-3-53, MISSISSIPPI CODE OF 1972, TO REQUIRE THE OFFICE OF EDUCATIONAL ACCOUNTABILITY TO COMPILE AND INCLUDE IN THE MISSISSIPPI REPORT CARD DATA REFLECTING SCHOOL DISTRICTS' SPENDING FOR EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES COMPARED TO SPENDING FOR NONEDUCATIONAL PURPOSES AND SPENDING ON CLASSROOM TECHNOLOGY COMPARED TO TOTAL DISTRICT SPENDING; AND FOR RELATED PURPOSES.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF MISSISSIPPI:

SECTION 1. Section 37-3-53, Mississippi Code of 1972, is amended as follows:

37-3-53. (1) Each school year, the State Board of Education, acting through the Office of Educational Accountability, shall develop a public school reporting system, or "Mississippi Report Card," on the performance of students and schools at the local, district and state level. In developing the report card, the Office of Educational Accountability shall collect school, district and state level student achievement data in the appropriate grades as designated by the State Board of Education in all core subjects, and compare the data with national standards to identify students' strengths and weaknesses. The Mississippi Report Card shall provide more than reports to parents on the level at which their children are performing; the report shall provide clear and comparable public information on the level at which schools, school districts and the state public education system are performing. The Office of Educational Accountability shall encourage local school districts and the general public to use Mississippi Report Card information along with local individual student data to assess the quality of instructional programs and the performance of schools and to plan and implement programs of instructional improvement.

(2) * * * The Mississippi Report Card shall include information, as compiled by the Office of Compulsory School Attendance Enforcement, which demonstrates clearly the absenteeism and dropout rates in each school district and the state and whether those rates reflect a positive or negative change from the same information as reported in the previous year's Mississippi Report Card.

(3) (a) The Office of Educational Accountability shall require each school district to annually submit a report to the office comparing the district's spending for educational purposes with spending for noneducational purposes. The report must reflect total spending in the district without regard to the source of funds. In order to assure uniformity among the reports from the various school districts, the Office of Educational Accountability shall promulgate reporting guidelines that specifically define the components of the terms "educational purposes" and "noneducational purposes." Data compiled from the reports must be included in the Mississippi Report Card in a ratio format that reflects each school district's spending for educational purposes compared to spending for noneducational purposes. In addition, the Office of Educational Accountability shall assign a performance indicator to each school district's spending ratio which may be used to compare spending patterns among the various school districts.

(b) A school district shall include in the report required under this subsection data comparing the district's spending on classroom technology to the district's total spending. The Office of Educational Accountability shall define the specific components of the term "classroom technology." A ratio reflecting each school district's spending for classroom technology purposes, in comparison to total spending in the district, and a performance indicator assigned by the Office of Educational Accountability must be included in the Mississippi Report Card.

SECTION 2. This act shall take effect and be in force from and after July 1, 2002.