Arkansas News Bureau
LITTLE ROCK — A bill intended to tighten school attendance under Arkansas’ school choice law advanced in a House committee Tuesday.
Among other things, House Bill 2003 by Rep. John Lowery, D-El Dorado, would impose a $1,000 fine — up from $500 — for giving a false address so a child can attend school in a district other than where he lives.
The bill passed the House Education Committee on a voice vote and goes to the House.
The bill’s main purpose is to tighten requirements for attending schools under the school choice law and to give the state more oversight of transfers, according to Lowery, who said the need for the measure surfaced because of a lawsuit challenging the 1989 School Choice Act.
The U.S. Supreme Court struck down school choice plans in Kentucky in 2007.
The Arkansas law allows a student to apply for a transfer to a school district outside of the district in which he or she lives. However, as a safeguard against racial segregation, the law prohibits a student from transferring to a district where the percentage of the student’s race exceeds the percentage in the student’s home district, with some exceptions.
In October, parents of at least 45 white students in four small school districts bordering the Malvern School District — Glen Rose, Magnet Cove, Ouachita and Poyen — filed a federal lawsuit challenging the school choice law.
They sued after Malvern school officials informed them their children were attending the wrong school and should transfer to schools in the Malvern district.
The lawsuit, filed in federal district court in Hot Springs, argues the School Choice Act unconstitutionally makes race the sole factor in determining whether a student can transfer.
HB 2003 would prohibit a school district from admitting a student who does not live in the district for at least 10 days pending an investigation.
It would require that a district that determines a student who lives within its borders is unlawfully attending another school district to notify the other district’s superintendent in writing. The district receiving notification would be required to investigate to determine which district the student is required to attend and report to the district that gave notice.
A student determined to be unlawfully attending a school outside his home district would be barred from attending the nonresident district. In an appeal to the state Department of Education, the district that conducted the investigation would have the burden of proving the student is entitled to attend its school.
