81R2228 KSD-F
By: Gonzalez Toureilles H.B. No. 4065
A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
AN ACT
relating to tuition and fee exemptions at public institutions of
higher education for students who have been in foster care or
certain other residential care.
BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
SECTION 1. Section 54.211(a), Education Code, is amended to
read as follows:
(a) A student is exempt from the payment of tuition and fees
authorized in this chapter, including tuition and fees charged by
an institution of higher education for a dual credit course or other
course for which a high school student may earn joint high school
and college credit, if the student:
(1) was in foster care or other residential care under
the conservatorship of the Department of Family and Protective
Services [on or after]:
(A) on the day preceding the student's 18th
birthday;
(B) on or after the day of the student's 14th
birthday, if the student was also eligible for adoption on or after
that day; or
(C) on the day the student graduated from high
school or received the equivalent of a high school diploma; and
(2) enrolls in an institution of higher education as
an undergraduate student not later than[:
[(A) the third anniversary of the date the
student was discharged from the foster or other residential care,
the date the student graduated from high school, or the date the
student received the equivalent of a high school diploma, whichever
date is earliest; or
[(B)] the student's 25th [21st] birthday.
SECTION 2. Section 54.211, Education Code, as amended by
this Act, applies beginning with tuition and other fees charged for
the 2009 fall semester. Tuition and other fees charged for an
academic period before that semester are covered by the law in
effect immediately before the effective date of this Act, and the
former law is continued in effect for that purpose.
SECTION 3. This Act takes effect immediately if it receives
a vote of two-thirds of all the members elected to each house, as
provided by Section 39, Article III, Texas Constitution. If this
Act does not receive the vote necessary for immediate effect, this
Act takes effect September 1, 2009.