HB 602 Georgia House · 2025-2026 Regular Session

Education; denial of state funds for loans, grants, and scholarships for any student convicted of a criminal offense; provisions

Summary

A BILL to be entitled an Act to amend Chapter 1 of Title 20 of the Official Code of Georgia Annotated, relating to general provisions relative to education, so as to provide for the denial of state funds for loans, grants, and scholarships for any student who is convicted of a criminal offense or who is determined by the postsecondary educational institution at which such student is enrolled to have violated a postsecondary educational institution's code of conduct for students when such conviction or determination is a result of a student engaging in materially and substantially disruptive conduct on such postsecondary educational institution's campus; to provide for related matters; to repeal conflicting laws; and for other purposes.

Bill status died 1 of 4 stages cleared

Introduction

Feb 2025

Committee Review

Floor Vote

Governor

Introduced Feb 24, 2025 Last action Apr 4, 2025

Maddy AI version diff · 1 comparison

What changed between versions

LC 61 0093/a → LC 61 0214S/hs · 7 edits

MODERATE

This bill was amended to remove provisions allowing denial of state funds based on violations of a postsecondary institution's code of conduct, limiting the sanction to only criminal convictions resulting from materially and substantially disruptive conduct. The duration of the funding denial was also shortened from two academic years to the end of the current term and the next term. These changes narrow the bill's scope to focus solely on criminal conduct rather than broader disciplinary violations.

Scope change

The bill's scope was narrowed by removing the ability to deny state funds for code of conduct violations, restricting sanctions to criminal convictions only.

ELIGIBILITY

Removed the provision allowing denial of state funds for students determined to have violated their institution's code of conduct, limiting sanctions to criminal convictions only.

TIMELINE

Changed the duration of funding denial from two academic years to the end of the current term and the next term.

DEFINITION

Removed the definition of 'academic year' from the bill.

Simplified the definition of 'harassment' by removing the requirement that it must deny equal access to opportunities or benefits.

Modified the definition of 'materially and substantially disruptive conduct' by removing item (vi) regarding harassment and changing 'transaction of the business' to 'transaction of business'.

Changed 'without consent of the postsecondary educational institution' to 'without consent from the postsecondary educational institution' in the definition of materially and substantially disruptive conduct.

REQUIREMENT

Added Section 2 to explicitly repeal all laws conflicting with this Act.

Floor votes

How they voted

No floor votes recorded yet.

Full legislative history

Actions timeline

Total actions

Key actions

Committee

Apr 4, 2025

Committee

House Withdrawn, Recommitted

lower

Mar 6, 2025

Lower · Passed

House Committee Favorably Reported By Substitute

lower

Feb 24, 2025

Introduced

House Hopper

lower

6 primary · 0 co-sponsors