BILL #    SB 1583	TITLE: school admission; annual parental disclosure
SPONSOR:    Wadsack	STATUS: Senate Engrossed
PREPARED BY:    Gordon Robertson

Description

The bill would require each public school to send an annual disclosure to be signed by the parents and guardians of each student acknowledging the school’s letter grade and the educational options available to students and parents. The bill would require the Arizona Department of Education (ADE) to develop a standard form that public schools could use to satisfy this requirement. The bill would also require public schools to assist parents and guardians who wish to enroll their child in a charter school or in the Empowerment Scholarship Account (ESA) program after receiving the disclosure.

Estimated Impact

Based on information from ADE, we estimate the bill would cost between $2,500 and $6,000 to develop a standard disclosure form, of which up to $1,000 would be ongoing. To the extent that some public school districts and charter schools may choose to develop their own disclosure form, there may be additional costs borne by local public schools.

Analysis

ADE estimates that the bill would cost $2,500 in one-time administrative costs to develop a blank disclosure form for all public schools. ADE further estimated that if they were to generate individualized versions of the disclosure form populated with information specific to each public school, the department would incur one-time costs of $5,000 and ongoing costs of $1,000 for the generation of these forms.

We have not attempted to determine how the bill may affect school enrollment decisions, which may in turn affect K-12 basic state aid formula expenses.

Local Government Impact

The annual disclosure required by the bill would include a list of charter schools located within a reasonable distance of the public school and an overview of the ESA program, including award amounts and approved expenses.

To the extent that each public school would be required to research charter school alternatives and available ESA award amounts, we estimate that the annual disclosure would increase workload for public school districts and charter schools, which may generate additional staffing costs. Should ADE provide individualized forms to each public school, these additional local costs would likely be eliminated.

The bill would also require public school districts and charters schools to assist parents and guardians who wish to pursue admittance to a charter school or to participate in the ESA program after receiving the annual disclosure document. We estimate that this requirement would generate additional workload for public school districts and charter schools, but we lack information on the extent of the assistance required by the bill. The actual cost to public schools to assist parents and guardians in changing their students' enrollment would depend on the degree of assistance provided by public schools.

3/5/24