AN ACT Relating to updating application requirements for the academic acceleration incentive program; and amending RCW 28A.320.195 and 28A.320.196.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF WASHINGTON:

Sec. 1.  RCW 28A.320.195 and 2013 c 184 s 2 are each amended to read as follows:

(1) Each school district board of directors is encouraged to adopt an academic acceleration policy for high school students as provided under this section.

(2) Under an academic acceleration policy:

(a) The district automatically enrolls any student who meets the state standard on the high school statewide student assessment in the next most rigorous level of advanced courses offered by the high school. Students who successfully complete such an advanced course are then enrolled in the next most rigorous level of advanced course, with the objective that students will eventually be automatically enrolled in courses that offer the opportunity to earn dual credit for high school and college.

(b) The subject matter of the advanced courses in which the student is automatically enrolled depends on the content area or areas of the statewide student assessment where the student has met the state standard. Students who meet the state standard on ((both end-of-course)) the tenth grade mathematics assessment((s)) are considered to have met the state standard for high school mathematics and may be eligible for advanced courses in mathematics, science, or computer science. Students who meet the state standard in both reading and writing are eligible for enrollment in advanced courses in English, social studies, humanities, and other related subjects.

(c) The district must notify students and parents or guardians regarding the academic acceleration policy and the advanced courses available to students.

(d) The district must provide a parent or guardian with an opportunity to opt out of the academic acceleration policy and enroll a student in an alternative course.

Sec. 2.  RCW 28A.320.196 and 2015 c 202 s 2 are each amended to read as follows:

(1) Subject to funds appropriated specifically for this purpose, the academic acceleration incentive program is established as provided in this section. The intent of the legislature is that the funds awarded under the program be used to ((support)) increase equitable access to dual credit opportunities, such as supporting teacher training, curriculum, technology, examination fees, textbook fees, and other costs associated with offering dual credit courses to high school students, including transportation for running start students to and from the institution of higher education as defined in RCW 28A.600.300.

(2) The office of the superintendent of public instruction shall allocate half of the funds appropriated for the purposes of this section on a competitive basis to provide one-time grants, renewable for one additional year, for high schools to expand the availability of dual credit courses. ((To be eligible for a grant, a school district must have adopted an academic acceleration policy as provided under RCW 28A.320.195.)) In making grant awards, the office of the superintendent of public instruction must give priority to grants for high schools with a high proportion of low-income students, high schools identified as having high disproportionality in their dual credit enrollment data, and high schools seeking to develop new capacity for dual credit courses rather than proposing marginal expansion of current capacity.

(3) The office of the superintendent of public instruction shall allocate half of the funds appropriated for the purposes of this section to school districts as an incentive award for each student who earned dual high school and college credit, as described under subsection (4) of this section, for courses offered by the district's high schools during the previous school year. School districts must distribute the award to the high schools that generated the funds, to be used in ways that increase equitable access to dual credit. The award amount for low-income students eligible to participate in the federal free and reduced-price meals program who earn dual credits must be set at one hundred twenty-five percent of the base award for other students. A student who earns more than one dual credit in the same school year counts only once for the purposes of the incentive award.

(4) For the purposes of this section, the following students are considered to have earned dual high school and college credit in a course offered by a high school:

(a) Students who achieve a score of three or higher on an AP examination;

(b) Students who achieve a score of four or higher on an examination of the international baccalaureate diploma ((programme)) program;

(c) Students who successfully complete a Cambridge advanced international certificate of education examination;

(d) Students who successfully complete a course through the college in the high school program under RCW 28A.600.290 and are awarded college credit by the partnering institution of higher education; and

(e) Students who satisfy the dual enrollment and class performance requirements to earn college credit through a ((tech prep)) career and technical education dual credit course.

(5) If a high school provides access to online courses for students to earn dual high school and college credit at no cost to the student, such a course is considered to be offered by the high school.

(6) The office of the superintendent of public instruction shall report to the education policy committees and the fiscal committees of the legislature, by January 1st of each year, information about the demographics of the students earning dual credits in the schools receiving grants under this section for the prior school year. Demographic data shall be disaggregated pursuant to RCW 28A.300.042.

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