The fate of two pieces of legislation – one increasing access to dual enrollment classes for private school students, and one overhauling the rules governing high school sports and other extracurricular activities – looked uncertain going into the penultimate week of Florida’s legislative session.
The dual enrollment bill had gotten traction in the Senate, where Sen. Kelli Stargel, R-Lakeland, was trying to address an unintended consequence of funding changes made two years ago that created a dilemma for some private schools whose high school students wanted to earn college credit. A similar bill had not been heard in the House.
The high school sports bill, meanwhile, was taken up Tuesday on the House floor and will likely come up for a vote today, but had faced an uncertain future in the Senate, where it had only cleared one of its three assigned committees.
Both measures received new life on Tuesday, when the Senate Appropriations panel added them to a massive education bill, with pages numbering in the triple digits, which tackles everything from K-12 school uniforms to the scope of the state’s community college system.
Some Senators, like Jack Latvala, R-Clearwater, raised concerns about parts of the package. The high school sports portions, he said, appear “very problematic to a lot of people.” Dubbed by some supporters as a “let-the-kids-play” measure, it’s aimed at preventing students from being sidelined by recruiting investigations by the Florida High School Athletic Association — an issue that tends to arise when students move from one school to another. Critics have charged it could make it harder to prevent recruiting.
Meanwhile, the two main expansions of parental choice this session are moving closer to a resolution. A bill expanding Personal Learning Scholarship Accounts for special needs students, which already passed the Senate, is slated to be taken up in the House on Thursday. So is an expansion of public school choice, which the Senate also is expected to take up in the coming days.
In other words, while some issues still need to be resolved, it looks like the standoff over Medicaid and hospital funding won’t stop the progress of policy changes in school choice or other areas, a point Senate President Andy Gardiner underscored Tuesday morning.
