Idaho § 33-1002G

§ 33-1002G.

career technical center funding and eligibility. (1) School districts, public charter schools, and eligible cooperative service agencies may establish career technical centers that qualify for funding appropriated for the specific purpose of supporting the added cost of career technical centers. These funds will be appropriated to the state board for career technical education, to be expended by the division of career technical education. In order for a center to qualify for funding as a career technical center, it must make application to the division of career technical education on or before the fifteenth of April for the following fiscal year. This includes applicants for new centers and renewal applications. Approved public charter schools with career technical education programs will receive the same added cost unit as any other eligible center on an actual approved cost basis not to exceed the per-student cost for a traditional instructional delivery method. All career technical centers must meet all three (3) of the following criteria:

(a) The program serves students from two (2) or more high schools. No one (1) high school can comprise more than eighty-five percent (85%) of the total enrolled career technical center students, unless it is a new program in the first or second year of operation. During the first year of operation of a new program, no more than one (1) high school may comprise more than ninety-five percent (95%) of the total enrolled career technical students and no more than ninety percent (90%) of the total enrolled career technical students during the second year of operation. In the event a student enrolled in the career technical center is not enrolled in a public high school or is attending the sponsoring school district’s high school through the school district’s open enrollment policy for the purpose of accessing the career technical education program, the eighty-five percent (85%) will be calculated based on the public high school attendance area where the student resides. This provision does not exclude a public charter school with a statewide boundary from applying for appropriate added cost funds authorized for career technical education, irrespective of the instructional delivery method. In the event an existing career technical program that has been in operation for more than three (3) years should have the enrollment of career technical students increase to more than eighty-five percent (85%) in a single year, the division of career technical education may choose, with an approved enrollment plan, to use the program’s three (3) year rolling average enrollment between participating high schools for determining eligibility.

(b) The majority of the program’s offerings lead to some form of postsecondary credit, such as dual credit or other advanced opportunities, as defined by the state board of education, or include apprenticeship opportunities.

(c) All programs offer at least one (1) supervised field experience for all students.

(2) All career technical centers must also meet at least one (1) of the following three (3) requirements:

(a) The center is funded separately from schools that qualify for computation using regular secondary support units.

(b) The center has a separate and distinct governing board.

(c) The majority of the programs are provided at dedicated facilities that are separate from the regular high school facilities.

(3) An eligible cooperative service agency, formed pursuant to section 33-317 , Idaho Code, must own or maintain a facility separate from any of the member school districts making up the cooperative service agency.

[33-1002G, added 1998, ch. 261, sec. 2, p. 864; am. 1999, ch. 329, sec. 2, p. 854; am. 2016, ch. 25, sec. 7, p. 39; am. 2018, ch. 341, sec. 1, p. 781; am. 2019, ch. 298, sec. 1, p. 881; am. 2022, ch. 14, sec. 1, p. 33; am. 2023, ch. 271, sec. 1, p. 814.]