House Education Committee hears governors omnibus education bill, holds it over for more detail

Anchorage

The Alaska House Education Committee on Monday, April 7, 2025, heard House Bill 76, the governors omnibus education proposal that includes measures on open enrollment, student transportation, a student cell-phone restriction, reading-proficiency incentive grants and changes to the charter-application process. Committee members heard department testimony, questioned department officials about funding and implementation, and held the bill over for further consideration and fiscal detail.

The bill is pitched as a mix of policy changes and new recurring funding to "provide sustained financial resources" and policy incentives to improve student outcomes, strengthen teacher retention and empower families, Commissioner Dina Bishop told the committee. "Within this bill as it's carried out, there's over $180,000,000 in recurring education funding through the foundation formula, grants, and direct teacher payments," Bishop said as she introduced the measure.

Why it matters: HB 76 would alter how students may transfer between public schools in Alaska, add an additional student-counting opportunity for districts that gain students midyear, create incentives to reward reading growth in K—6, require districts to adopt cell-phone policies limiting in-class use, and adjust processes and funding related to charter schools, school transportation and school bond debt reimbursement. Committee members focused on how the department estimated costs, how districts would implement transportation and open-enrollment policies, whether rural communities would be disadvantaged, and how the state would verify and report outcomes.

Open enrollment and spring count: The bill would permit families to enroll students in public schools outside of their assigned attendance area when space is available, and it would require districts to publish enrollment and capacity data by grade. Commissioner Bishop said the policy is intended to make existing, sometimes covert, student moves transparent and to give parents more choice: "This is about putting parents in our state back in the driver's seat to make some choices," she said.

Because Alaska's foundation formula currently ties funding to an October 20 student count, HB 76 proposes a spring ADM (average daily membership) count that would allow districts that gain students after the fall count to be trued up. Deputy Commissioner Karen Morrison told the committee the spring-count provision would carry an estimated $438,000 annual investment to cover districts that see increased enrollment at year-end.

Transportation and mobilization: Committee members repeatedly questioned how students would reach schools outside their neighborhoods. Deputy Commissioner Morrison and Department director Heather Heineken described two pieces: a statewide increase in pupil-transportation funding and an estimated mobilization payment tied to the open-enrollment initiative.

Morrison said the bill includes a roughly $14.5 million annual increase in pupil-transportation funding (about a 20% increase over current statute language). Heineken explained the departments initial methodology for the open-enrollment reimbursement estimate: it used an "in-lieu-of" reimbursement model, assumed a $15 daily reimbursement rate, a 180-day school year and used a conservative estimate equal to 1% of ADM (about 1,247 students in the departments calculation) to estimate roughly $3.37 million annually for direct parent reimbursements.

Cell-phone policy: HB 76 would require school districts to adopt a policy restricting student use of personal mobile communication devices during the school day, with exceptions for instruction and other permitted uses. Bishop and members said the policy aligns with other cell-phone bills heard this session. Members asked about translation uses, district-issued devices and local discretion for very small or remote schools; department staff said instructional and health exceptions would be allowed and that districts could tailor procedures for remote or very small sites.

Reading proficiency and learning-growth incentive grants: The bill proposes a K—6 reading-proficiency and learning-growth incentive grant of $450 per eligible student. Karen Morrison said the governors proposal would represent a $22 million annual investment based on existing assessment data and would apply to about 48,847 students who currently meet growth or proficiency criteria. The department described the program as paying districts for demonstrated student growth as well as proficiency, not as a line-item payment to individual students.

Charter-application process: HB 76 would allow a local government agency or specified non-district entity to receive and forward a charter-school application to the state Board of Education if a district declines to hear the charter. The department said the change responds to stakeholder testimony that charter applications can be delayed or "slow-rolled" at the district level. Multiple representatives raised concerns about local control and the potential for state- or outside-entities to override locally determined capacity or community priorities.

School bond debt reimbursement and other fiscal items: The bill would extend the current moratorium on bond debt reimbursement through July 1, 2030, and the department said the package includes programmatic and statutory budget changes that will be discussed in the committees fiscal review. The department described bond-reimbursement rules, historical splits and the state's liability concerns if many local bonds were approved in a short period.

Questions and next steps: Committee members asked the department to provide additional detail on the departments methodology for the transportation estimate and on who currently uses boundary exemptions or private transportation arrangements that the bill would reimburse. Members also sought peer-reviewed evidence and examples for incentive-based reading funding; the department said it would provide additional research to the committee.

The committee did not vote on HB 76. Co-chair Story announced the bill will be held over and that the committee will continue the hearing on Friday with further fiscal detail and a presentation on student attendance and chronic absenteeism. "House Bill 76 will be held over," the co-chair said at adjournment.

Sources: Testimony and presentation by Commissioner Dina Bishop, Deputy Commissioner Karen Morrison and Director Heather Heineken, Department of Education and Early Development; House Education Committee hearing, April 7, 2025.