SB417 Alabama 2012 Session

Existing law prevents a child instructed at home by a private tutor or at a church school to participate in extracurricular activities offered by public schools.

This bill would create the Tim Tebow Act.

This bill would define the term extracurricular to mean school authorized athletics and athletic teams.

This bill would allow a student being taught at home or at a church school to participate in athletics and on athletic teams.

This bill would require participating students to adhere to the same requirements as public school students concerning activity fees, standards of behavior, responsibility, performance, conduct, academic standards, and residency requirements.

This bill would require a participating student who participates in an extracurricular activity at a public school to commit to and only participate in that extracurricular activity at that public school for the duration of the school year, and would allow a student to participate in different extracurricular activities at the same public school.

This bill would require student standards for participation in interscholastic extracurricular activities to be applied beginning with the first semester of the 7th grade year of the participating student.

This bill would specify that insurance coverage provided by a school board for participants in extracurricular activities would cover a child instructed at home by private tutor or under church school law.

This bill would also specify that no school team utilizing these students would be impeded from competing against any other public or private school team.

This bill would also allow such students to participate in these activities in a nonpublic school, if the nonpublic school permits such student participation.

Amendment 621 of the Constitution of Alabama of 1901, now appearing as Section 111.05 of the Official Recompilation of the Constitution of Alabama of 1901, as amended, prohibits a general law whose purpose or effect would be to require a new or increased expenditure of local funds from becoming effective with regard to a local governmental entity without enactment by a 2/3 vote unless: it comes within one of a number of specified exceptions; it is approved by the affected entity; or the Legislature appropriates funds, or provides a local source of revenue, to the entity for the purpose.

The purpose or effect of this bill would be to require a new or increased expenditure of local funds within the meaning of the amendment. However, the bill does not require approval of a local governmental entity or enactment by a 2/3 vote to become effective because it comes within one of the specified exceptions contained in the amendment.

Relating to education; providing for the Tim Tebow Act; permitting a child instructed at home either by a private tutor or under the church school law to participate in extracurricular athletic activities in public schools and nonpublic schools that accept a student; to provide certain requirements; to require a participating student to commit to and only participate in an extracurricular activity at that public school for the school year; to allow a student to participate in different extracurricular activities at the same public school; to require student standards for participation in interscholastic extracurricular activities to be applied beginning with the first semester of the 7th grade year of the participating student; to provide for insurance coverage for extracurricular athletic activities; to specify schools utilizing such students may not be impeded from competing against other schools; and in connection therewith would have as its purpose or effect the requirement of a new or increased expenditure of local funds within the meaning of Amendment 621 of the Constitution of Alabama of 1901, now appearing as Section 111.05 of the Official Recompilation of the Constitution of Alabama of 1901, as amended.