SB 110-UNDER SCHOOL AGE STUDENTS  CHAIR FRED DYSON announced SB 110 to be up for consideration. MR. EDDY JEANS, School Finance Manager, Department of Education and Early Development, explained this legislation would clarify in statute the ability of school districts to early-enroll children who are under school age, if they are ready for the academics that are being provided to them. The reason the department asked for this legislation is that it has come to their attention that a number of school districts in the state are basically blanketly enrolling all four-year olds in what they call a two-year kindergarten program. The department does not believe that was the intent of this legislation and that it was intended strictly to allow the exceptional child to get in early. The bill says the state's intent is to provide 13 years of funding for K-12, not 14 years of funding. SENATOR GRETCHEN GUESS asked if this prohibits a school district from having a two-year kindergarten if they want to use other sources of funding. MR. JEANS replied that it would not. It just says they would not be able to claim those kids for state foundation funding. SENATOR BETTYE DAVIS asked how much this would save and how many school districts were doing it. She asked if the children who are identified as needing the two years would be able to continue. MR. JEANS replied the department believes this section of statute was intended for the exceptional child coming into kindergarten at four-years old and advance to first grade at five years old as opposed to coming into kindergarten at five like most do. Some schools have instituted a two-year kindergarten program, but he would argue that it's preschool. SENATOR DAVIS repeated how many exceptional students are there. "Do you know the number?" MR. JEANS replied that their fiscal note identifies all four- year olds that were claimed under the foundation formula this year. There is a savings of $3.9 million. "We believe some of these children are eligible to be early-enrolled, but the exact number I could not tell you. We believe it's a very small number." He noted that right now over 600 four-year olds have been enrolled in school statewide. SENATOR DAVIS asked if he had asked the districts to identify those children. MR. JEANS replied that the districts do evaluations, but the standards have been set low enough to allow any four year old to enter into kindergarten. He explained that the age date in statute is August 15, so if a child turns 5 on August 17, he can be evaluated to determine if he is ready to enter kindergarten. We're trying to address an issue that's come to our attention since we started collecting student level data and we can identify that in some school districts, the population of four year olds is almost identical to the population of five year olds, which leads us to believe they are enrolling them all. SENATOR WILKEN asked when this first surfaced as a foundation formula issue. MR. JEANS replied they had been collecting student level data for four years. He heard rumors of it prior to collecting the data, but he couldn't verify it. He now has birth dates. SENATOR WILKEN noted a spreadsheet in their packets that show five school districts account for about $2.5 million of the $3.5 million in funding. CHAIR DYSON said it was recommended that lines 11-13 be deleted. MR. JEANS replied that is correct. It was a clerical error and the House had already deleted it from their bill. He explained that the last sentence says a child under school age may be admitted to first grade or higher, if they meet the minimum standards. This would prevent that exceptional child from being able to enter kindergarten. He added that this is not strictly a foundation program issue. "If we provide foundation funding for four-year olds, then we have to allow those kids to be counted for space. So, it also affects our facility site at the shop." SENATOR GUESS said she hoped that an under-age school child was defined somewhere. Are they just talking about kindergarten to first grade? She wanted to make sure there were no unintended consequences at any other grade levels. MR. JEANS replied that was right. It is not their intent to prevent children who need to be held back from being held back. The funding is based on 13 years of schooling. MR. JOHN DAVIS, Superintendent of the Bering Straits School District, opposed SB 110. He said it represents an effort to control state spending, but he is concerned that it would only save money in the short term. This service is being provided to children who are among the most vulnerable and educationally needy. However, the reduction in funding for this program would not create the $3.5 million represented. He contended that the bill would cost the district and state additional funds in remedial services and other special services to help those students who will need any help they can get in the future, but that in his district that would not be a large number. The Bering Straits School District has participated in this program for the last 13 years and he contends this is not a new issue to the department. SUPERINTENDENT DAVIS said that they had heard that this program is intended for only 13 years, but students who do not qualify for a diploma through a high school qualifying exam will be eligible for yet another year of school and possibly two. He would like to continue this program to see that students have this effort early and the expectation of passing the exam will be more likely. CHAIR DYSON asked how many students he has enrolled in this category. SUPERINTENDENT DAVIS replied that he has 100 children per class in his school district and this category has 90 students. District wide there is a student count of 1,800. MR. BRUCE JOHNSON, Association of Alaska School Boards, drew their attention to the governor's investment plan as he outlined his budget. One of the categories under the mission for the Department of Education and Early Development states high quality early care and education programs that improve the well being of young children. Their contention is that the statute as it currently exists allows for that early intervention into the lives of four-year olds who often reside in poor, remote, rural areas of our state. The notion is that the state begins to serve those kids as a preventative action. A study conducted by the Economic Policy Institute talks about equity at the starting gate regarding social background and differences in achievement as children begin school. This study validates that children enter school with wide achievement disparities and that children in the highest socio-economic groups scored 60 percent higher in mathematics and reading as compared to children in the lowest categories. These findings have helped support what many educators have known for years - the achievement gap begins long before children enter school. CHAIR DYSON stated that he personally didn't see any correlation between economic standards and school success. He thought the social and cultural values of a family make the biggest difference. SENATOR WILKEN asked if they didn't do anything about SB 110, would the Fairbanks North Star Borough be able to count all four-year olds as kindergarteners. MR. JEANS replied that is what could happen this issue is before the Legislature now to get some clarity on application of the statute. SENATOR WILKEN said this looks truly like a policy call that is driven by the finances. CHAIR DYSON asked Mr. Jeans if he need legislation to be able to regulate the qualification standards. MR. JEANS answered that local school districts set the standards by department regulation. A number of different instruments can be used to assess whether or not a child is ready for kindergarten or first grade and the department did not feel it could say which particular assessment everyone should use. He felt that regulation basically had no effect. He said this legislation would go a long way to cure the problem. SENATOR GREEN moved on page 1, to delete language on line 12 beginning with "a child" through line 13. There were no objections and it was so ordered. SENATOR DAVIS said she needed some clarification. She said people in those five school districts whom she has talked with say those children need more time. They are not coming in because they're exceptional, but because they will need more than kindergarten in order to move into the first grade and they want to start with them as early as they can. That service should be provided to those that need it, like with the Headstart program. SENATOR GREEN said it would be interesting to compare the two programs in Finance. SENATOR DAVIS said that Headstart was not necessarily in the five districts that are using this program. TAPE 03-17, SIDE B    SENATOR DAVIS said that some of districts might have Headstart, but that some kids from every district need more than 13 years to get through school. Some kids are kept in kindergarten and some are held back in first grade. She said this bill hurts the kids who need it the most. MR. JEANS agreed with many of the things she said, but they are talking about a policy call of whether or not the State of Alaska wants to provide preschool funding through the foundation program. Many districts would enroll four year olds if they thought they were going to get state funding for them. Many of the districts on the list generate impact aid funding. If they operate a preschool program, they will continue to generate impact aid funding, which the state will not count in the foundation program. The districts would be able to retain 100 percent of that funding and continue to support their program. It's a fairness question. If some can do it, all have to be able to do it. SENATOR WILKEN moved to pass CSSB 110 (HES) from committee with individual recommendations and attached fiscal note. There were no objections and it was so ordered.