One responsibility of the school district, as stated in House Bill 72, is to “develop policies for awarding credit to students who are not enrolled for a complete grading period. Policies shall ensure that the student is treated fairly in terms of meeting the intent of this subsection.” ( Award of Credit, Grades 9-12). In an effort to assist specific needs of the migrant student, this material contains viable options which a school district may incorporate into its policies. These policies should meet the educational needs of the migrant student who enters school late and/or withdraws from school early. INTRODUCTION In preparing a policy of this nature, the specific needs of the migrant student and the requirements of a school district must be taken into consideration. After attention is given to these issues, a policy acceptable to the school district and fair to the migrant student may be developed. On the following pages are a rationale, goal, objectives, and several options that school districts can utilize in developing late entry/early withdrawal policies for granting credit.

RATIONALE The migrant student is part of a school population with unique needs due to migrating with their parents to pursue agriculture- or fishing-related employment. For many migrant students, a pattern of entering school late and/or withdrawing from school early has made it very difficult, if not impossible, to complete course requirements and/or credits to graduate from high school. Teachers and administrators have also struggled with a consistent procedure for obtaining and awarding grades for migrant students. Late entry/early withdrawal policies may be developed to provide an opportunity for the migrant student to achieve academic success, thereby providing him/her with more viable options in the future. As with any other policy affecting students, the strong support and understanding of parents, students, teachers, counselors, and administrators is imperative to accomplish the intent and purpose of the policy.

To enhance the graduation rate of migrant students who may enter late or withdraw early by providing them fair and consistent options to complete courses and achieve required credits toward graduation. OBJECTIVES To provide specific procedures for: 1. transferring students’ grades from one school to another; 2. enabling students to complete course work missed due to late entry in school; 3. enabling students to complete course work missed due to early withdrawal from school; and 4. grading students consistently and fairly. GOAL

L ATE E NTRY P OLICY

C REDIT FOR C OURSES FOR H IGH S CHOOL G RADUATION M AY B E E ARNED O NLY IF THE S TUDENT R ECEIVED A G RADE E QUIVALENT TO 70 ON A S CALE OF 100, BASED UPON THE ESSENTIAL KNOWLEDGE AND SKILLS OF EACH COURSE (TEKS). B ELOW IS A SAMPLE OF MINIMUM GRADE ( S ) EARNING A PASSING S EMESTER A VERAGE FOR S EMESTER 1 AND S EMESTER 2 (EI-L EGAL ) 1 st Six Wks 2 nd. Six Wks 3 rd. Six Wks Sem. One Exam. 1 ST. Sem. Avg. 4 th. Six Wks 5 th Six Wks 6 th Six Wks Sem. Two Exam 2 nd Sem. Avg Credit

E ARLY W ITHDRAWAL P OLICY Edinburg CISD Migrant Education Program understands our Migrant Parents must withdraw their children from school early at times, however with the NEW State Assessment called STAAR-State of Texas Assessment of Academic Readiness all students including “Migrants” will be required to complete and pass all assigned classwork, and take their (STAAR) - EOC exams in order to receive credit and be on target for graduation. When possible, please notify the campus NGS- New Generation Clerk ten (10) days in advance if a migrant student is withdrawing early.

E ARLY W ITHDRAWAL P OLICYCONT. The NGS Clerk is required to fill-out the Texas Migrant Interstate Program—Student Referral form and complete the four (4) sections. The NGS Clerk will in turn scan the form(s) and them to along with a courtesy call to TMIP personnel to share specific details about the migrant student concerning the early withdrawal. The next slides will show a copy of the Texas Migrant Interstate Program—Student Referral Form and the two testing calendars for the school

I NSTRUCTIONAL O PTION P LANS Packet Plan – The teacher may have ready-made packets categorized according to scope and sequence. These packets will be ready for students to do make-up work for missed assignments. Packets should be ready to easily be divided by weeks. (Example: If a student will miss the first six-weeks, then give the highlights of that six-weeks). Contracts – Teacher-student contracts are individually done by the teacher. The teacher may grade a student’s make- up work by giving the student an informal assessment. Starting Point Plan- The teacher may decide to start giving the student grades after the enrollment date for work completed for the course with No penalty for previously missed grades. The teacher can be innovative in working with the student so that the student can earn a grade. Other – be assigned to our CTCOHS for Migrant Students (Only). See your high school migrant counselor for details….

S PECIAL M ESSAGE TO OUR M IGRANT P ARENTS Our Migrant Education Program recognizes the difficult choices our migrant parents face regarding the appropriate date and time to secure work in agriculture or fishery within Texas or out- of- State within the school year. So our sole intent is to guide and share with all our migrant parents new changes and best practices. A two-way communication between our migrant parents and the migrant personnel at the campus level is very important to ensure a good understanding of our primary goals of our Migrant Education Program. New State Assessments : STAAR, End-of-Course House Bill 5 : Under House Bill 5 (HB 5), passed by the 83 rd Texas Legislature and signed by the governor, high school students are now required to pass five State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness (STAAR®) end-of-course exams to meet the new graduation requirements. The five assessments under HB 5 include Algebra I, English I (Combined reading/writing), English II (Combined reading/writing), Biology, and U.S. History.