GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF NORTH CAROLINA
SESSION 2009
H 2
HOUSE BILL 593
Committee Substitute Favorable 5/11/09
Short Title: Change School Starting Date. |
(Public) |
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Sponsors: |
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Referred to: |
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March 16, 2009
A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
AN ACT to change the school starting date for students and to require local boards of education to conduct a public hearing before determining the opening and closing dates for the public schools.
The General Assembly of North Carolina enacts:
SECTION 1. G.S. 115C-84.2(d) reads as rewritten:
"(d) Opening and Closing
Dates. - Local boards of education shall determine the dates of opening and
closing the public schools under subdivision (a)(1) of this section. section
after conducting a public hearing. Except for year-round schools, the
opening date for students shall not be before August 25, and the
second Monday in August; the closing date for students shall not be after
June 10. On a showing of good cause, the State Board of Education may waive
this requirement to the extent that school calendars are able to provide
sufficient days to accommodate anticipated makeup days due to school closings.
A local board may revise the scheduled closing date if necessary in order to
comply with the minimum requirements for instructional days or instructional
time. For purposes of this subsection, the term "good cause" means
that schools in any local school administrative unit in a county have been
closed eight days per year during any four of the last 10 years because of
severe weather conditions, energy shortages, power failures, or other emergency
situations.
The State Board also may waive this requirement for an educational purpose. The term "educational purpose" means a local school administrative unit establishes a need to adopt a different calendar for (i) a specific school to accommodate a special program offered generally to the student body of that school, (ii) a school that primarily serves a special population of students, or (iii) a defined program within a school. The State Board may grant the waiver for an educational purpose for that specific school or defined program to the extent that the State Board finds that the educational purpose is reasonable, the accommodation is necessary to accomplish the educational purpose, and the request is not an attempt to circumvent the opening and closing dates set forth in this subsection. The waiver requests for educational purposes shall not be used to accommodate system-wide class scheduling preferences.
The required opening and closing dates under this subsection shall not apply to any school that a local board designated as having a modified calendar for the 2003-2004 school year or to any school that was part of a planned program in the 2003-2004 school year for a system of modified calendar schools, so long as the school operates under a modified calendar."
SECTION 2. This act is effective when it becomes law and applies beginning with the 2010-2011 school year.