Senate Bill S9682

                                 
BILL NUMBER: S9682

SPONSOR: LIU
 
TITLE OF BILL:

An act to amend the education law, in relation to the transfer of funds
from the tuition reimbursement account

 
PURPOSE OR GENERAL IDEA OF BILL:

To allow the State Education Department to transfer funds from the
tuition reimbursement account to the proprietary vocational school
supervision account when the balance of the tuition reimbursement
account exceeds $2.5 million.

 
SUMMARY OF SPECIFIC PROVISIONS:

Section 1 amends the education law to allow the commissioner to request
a maximum of $500,000 be transferred to the proprietary vocational
school supervision account in the event that the net balance of the
tuition reimbursement account is in excess of $2,500,000.

              

Section 2 provides for an effective date.

 
JUSTIFICATION:

The State Education Department's (SED) Bureau of Proprietary School
Supervision (BPSS) is responsible for licensing and monitoring the
private "proprietary" schools in New York State to ensure that students
receive a quality education and to protect the students' financial
interests. BPSS is also in charge of investigating student complaints
and conducting comprehensive investigations of proprietary schools to
assure compliance with Education Law and SED regulations.

Unfortunately, BPSS has been faced with limited resources making it
difficult for the office to carry out its functions. Currently,, there
are nearly 500 licensed proprietary schools in New York and that number
is growing each month. BPSS is facing extremely high caseloads for
educational technical assistance and backlogs in licensure renewals and
investigations of complaints. BPSS has no resources to investigate unli-
censed proprietary schools engaging in unlawful activities.

This legislation would allow SED to transfer funds, up to a maximum of
five hundred thousand dollars within a fiscal year, from the tuition
reimbursement account, which has funding above and beyond what is needed
to ensure student protection, to the proprietary school supervision
account. Transfers would be permitted when the tuition reimbursement
account has a net balance in excess of two million five hundred thousand
dollars.

Transferring this funding to the proprietary school supervision account
would allow BPSS to work to reduce educational technical assistance
caseloads, reduce backlogs in complaint investigations, improve licen-
sure renewal and other vital services, improve the quality of guidance
provided to the public regarding this sector of higher education, and
improve the fiscal tracking of assessments, penalty payments, and review
of annual financial statements. BPSS would also be able to establish a
more innovative method of curricular review and method of ensuring the
continued educational quality of proprietary schools. Enacting this
legislation would enhance BPSS's ability to fulfill its mission and
would provide tremendous benefit for the students attending proprietary
schools and the proprietary schools themselves.

 
PRIOR LEGISLATIVE HISTORY:

New bill.

 
FISCAL IMPLICATIONS:

None to the state.

 
EFFECTIVE DATE:
Immediately.