Highlights of the 79th Texas Legislature - Senate

EDUCATION/PUBLIC
Security in Public Schools—S.B. 11
By Senator Staples—House Sponsor: Representative Delisi
Currently, there are no statutory requirements for public schools to participate in emergency preparedness drills or
training for school teachers and administrators. This bill:
Requires each school district to adopt and implement a multi-hazard emergency operations plan that addresses
mitigation, preparedness, response, and recovery as recommended by the commissioner of education in conjunction
with the governor's office of homeland security for use in district schools.
Requires a school district, at least once every three years, to conduct a security audit of the district's facilities using,
to the extent possible, the security audit procedures developed by the Texas School Safety Center (center) or a
comparable public or private entity.
Requires a district to report the results of the security audit to the district's board of trustees.
Requires the emergency plan to include a system for providing immediate notification to parents or guardians through
a variety of communication methods in the event of an emergency.
Requires the center to conduct a safety training program for school districts that includes assistance in developing a
multi-hazard emergency operations plan for adoption.
Requires the center to develop security criteria that school districts may consider in the design of instructional
facilities.
Requires a school district that constructs a new instructional facility or conducts a major renovation of an existing
instructional facility using funds allotted to the district under this subchapter to consider, in the design of the
instructional facility, security criteria developed by the center.
Requires the center, no later than December 1, 2005, to develop a school safety program that includes certain
requirements and to develop certain security criteria.
Requires each school district, no later than March 1, 2006, to adopt a multi-hazard emergency operations plan.
Cooperation for Early Childhood Development—S.B. 23
By Senator Zaffirini et al.—House Sponsors: Representatives Kolkhorst and Naishtat
S.B. 76, 78th Legislature, Regular Session, 2003, permitted the State Center for Early Childhood Education to work
with agencies in 11 model demonstration projects to integrate and coordinate prekindergarten, Head Start, child care,
and after-school child care programs, and streamline eligibility and registration for those programs. Children in the
model programs have shown significant gains in language and literacy in short periods of time. This bill:
Authorizes the commissioner of education to establish a program to provide incentives for early childhood education
providers to coordinate services.
Allows governmental entities and community organizations in a coordination-of-resources demonstration project to
include early childhood education providers, such as Head Start and Early Head Start, prekindergarten, and afterschool
child-care program services, child-care services provided by nonprofit or for-profit entities, and faith-based
child-care programs.
HIGHLIGHTS - 79 TH TEXAS LEGISLATURE 77