Skill centers are regional secondary schools serving high school students from multiple school districts. They provide instruction in preparatory career and technical education programs that are either too expensive or too specialized for school districts to operate individually. Each skill center is operated by a host school district and governed by an administrative council in accordance with a cooperative agreement.
Students that attend skill centers must be funded for all classes at the skill center and at the sending school district, up to 1.6 full time equivalents (FTE). The Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction (OSPI) must develop procedures to ensure that no student is reported for more than 1.6 FTE combining both school district and skill center enrollment, and procedures to determine the appropriate share of FTE enrollment count between the school district and skill center.
OSPI is directed to develop procedures to fund students for 0.8 FTE at the sending school district, regardless of a student's actual enrolled weekly minutes at the sending school district, if the following criteria are met:
This new directive does not permit a student to be reported for more than 1.6 FTE when combining high school and skill center enrollment.
The committee recommended a different version of the bill than what was heard. PRO: Due to the limited resources and remote locations of many small districts, small district students don't have access to the same variety of graduation pathways as students in larger districts. These small districts are punished when they send students to skill centers because they lose the student FTE and it puts a burden on the district overall. Small districts have no economy of scale to offset these costs or independently offer rich and diverse opportunities. This bill eliminates competing interests. By removing the financial barrier, it will open the doorway for students to access essential programs. These skill center programs, such as nursing, construction, firefighting, and child care, will help solve workplace issues in these same rural communities.