Removing Barriers To Educator Preparation

The bill creates the student educator stipend program. The purpose of the student educator stipend program is to award stipend money to an eligible student to reduce the financial barriers of participating in required clinical practice as a student educator. An eligible student placed as a student educator in a 16-week academic residency may receive a stipend of $11,000, and an eligible student placed as a student educator in a 32-week academic residency may receive a stipend of $22,000. The bill also creates the educator test stipend program. The purpose of the educator test stipend program is to award stipend money to approved programs of preparation to reduce financial barriers for eligible students preparing for the assessment of professional competencies for licensure and each required endorsement area. The approved program of preparation shall distribute the stipend money to an eligible student to pay the fees and costs associated with the assessment of professional competencies, which may include travel and lodging costs. The bill creates the temporary educator loan forgiveness program. The purpose of the program is to pay the qualified loans of an educator who is hired for a hard-to-staff educator position. To qualify for the program, an educator must meet licensure requirements, enter the educator workforce on or after the 2019-20 state fiscal year and contract for a qualified position no later than the end of the 2021-22 state fiscal year, and be liable for an outstanding balance on a qualified loan. An educator who qualifies is eligible for up to $5,000 in loan forgiveness. The bill requires the department of education (department), in collaboration with the department of higher education, and institutions of higher education, the state board for community colleges and occupational education, and school districts, to create a recommend to the state board of education the standards and procedures necessary to implement the multiple measures approach to measure the professional competencies of an applicant for an initial teacher license, in addition to the assessments currently approved by the state board of education. The state board of education shall promulgate rules to establish the standards and procedures to measure professional competencies through the multiple measures approach.Current law allows the department to issue a temporary educator eligibility authorization to a person enrolled in an approved program of preparation for a special education educator license who has not yet met the requirements for the applicable initial educator license. The bill allows the department to issue a temporary educator eligibility authorization an interim authorization to a person enrolled in an approved alternative teacher preparation program who is seeking an alternative teacher license and meets the requirements for an alternative teacher license, except that the person has not yet met the requirements for the applicable initial educator license.For the 2022-23 state fiscal year, $52 million is appropriated to the department of higher education from the economic recovery and relief cash fund to be distributed to the following programs: $39 million for the student educator stipend program; $3 million for the educator test stipend program; and $10 million for the temporary educator loan forgiveness program. For the 2022-23 state fiscal year, $720,612 is appropriated to the department from the general fund to implement the purposes of the bill. (Note: Italicized words indicate new material added to the original summary; dashes through words indicate deletions from the original summary.) (Note: This summary applies to the reengrossed version of this bill as introduced in the second house.)