TEA has posted its proposed 2021-2022 Student Attendance Accounting Handbook. The revisions in this latest version include tweaks made to the low-attendance day waiver for the current school year, as well as amendments to incorporate changes made by recent legislation.
The public comment period for the proposed rules is from October 22, 2021 through November 22, 2021.
The revised low-attendance day waiver section is included below. The rule does not increase the number of available waiver days. Districts are still limited to 10 days or 4,200 minutes, unless otherwise authorized by the commissioner.
3.8.1.4 Low-Attendance Day Waivers
For a day when school was held but attendance was at least 10 percentage points below the overall average attendance rate for your district or the applicable campus for the prior year because of issues related to inclement weather, health, or safety, your district may apply for a waiver to have the day excluded from ADA and FSP funding calculations. An application for a low-attendance day waiver must be submitted using TEA’s automated waiver application system, which is available in TEAL. Your district must include the following items in its application:
- documentation of low attendance for the day, including the reason for the low attendance rate, and
- the prior year’s attendance report, showing the overall average attendance rate for the year for the district or applicable campus. For a district or campus with multiple tracks, the overall average attendance rate for all tracks must be used. For a campus that existed as two separate campuses the prior year, the overall average attendance rate for the district as a whole must be used.
These documents [can] should be uploaded as attachments in the automated waiver application system.
Note: For the 2021-2022 school year only, an LEA may choose to use prior year documentation from either the 2019–2020 school year or 2020–2021 school year as follows.
- If the 2019–2020 school year attendance report is selected, use only the average of the first four six-weeks attendance reporting periods, due to the closures during fifth and sixth six weeks of the 2019–2020 school year. Use the TSDS PEIMS Superintendent’s Report of Student Attendance 2019–2020 Summer Collection report (PDM3-130-001).
- If the 2020–2021 school year attendance report is selected, show the overall average attendance rate for the year for the district or applicable campus.