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Capitol Update Nov. 28, 2023
By Wisconsin School Administrators Alliance staff | November 29, 2023
Good Afternoon,
As you may have noticed the SAA website is under construction. We are working to move to a bifurcated webpage. Soon everyone will be receiving instructions on how to log in as well as a temporary password which you will be prompted to change on your first login. Until we can get everyone signed up, I wanted to provide a legislative update regarding a hearing held today in the Capitol.
Today, the Senate Committee on Mental Health, Substance Abuse Prevention, Children and Families held a Public Hearing on Senate Bill 597. This bill requires school boards to develop and implement a policy under which the custodial parent or guardian of a pupil who is under the age of 16 is notified of each document or material the pupil checks out from a school library as soon as is practicable, but no later than 24 hours after the checkout. The bill also requires a school board to annually notify parents and guardians of pupils enrolled in the school district of whether the school board provides pupils access to the electronic collection of resources known as Badger Link that is maintained by the Division for Libraries and Technology in the Department of Public Instruction.
Below are high-level talking points summarizing the challenges presented by the bill:
- This information can already be made available to parents/guardians upon request under FERPA.
- There are significant technical complexities and costs associated with integrating systems and software upgrades, which would likely be required to comply with the mandate created in SB 597.
- Many School Districts already provide this access to parents through the student’s library account or student information system account, making this new requirement duplicative.
- Given the staffing shortages impacting school districts it would be challenging to assign additional administrative duties to existing staff for what may be a duplication of information already provided to families through student accounts.
As always, please reach out if you have any questions.
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