Report Title:

DOE; Schools; Textbook Acquisition/Replacement Plan

WHEREAS, Board of Education Policy No. 2240 concerning instructional materials, which was first approved in 1970 and last amended in 1998, requires schools to develop and implement a multi-year textbook acquisition/replacement plan that is based on instructional needs; and

WHEREAS, schools are required to inform parents and make available to their school communities the textbook acquisition/replacement plan, its adequacy for meeting students' needs for textbooks in a given school year, and the textbook series, by subjects, used in the classrooms; and

WHEREAS, a recent survey of eighty-five secondary schools conducted by the Board of Education indicated that many almost one-half of the sixty-nine schools surveyed that responded to the survey were not in compliance with the Board of Education's policy concerning instructional materials, which suggests that many more schools may not be in compliance with that policy; and

WHEREAS, the response rate to the Board of Education's survey, and the compliance rate with Policy No. 2240, suggest that the Board's one hundred forty-three other policies are not being adequately monitored and enforced, and that the Board itself does not have the resources necessary to operate as an effective policy making body; and

WHEREAS, according to the Board of Education, sixty-three these sixty-nine middle and high schools reported needing an additional 134,274 textbooks to meet their requirements. Assuming the average cost of a secondary school textbook to be $40 to $45, the cost of replacing these 134,274 middle and high school textbooks would be $5,370,960 to $6,042,330 in 1999 dollars; and

WHEREAS, because the textbook requirements of middle and high schools are different from the textbook requirements of elementary schools, it is difficult to extrapolate from the textbook requirements of middle and high schools in order to estimate the textbook requirements of elementary schools; and

WHEREAS, despite the limitations of these data, it can be reasonably asserted that the statewide textbook shortage exceeds 134,274 textbooks, and that the total cost of replacing these textbooks exceeds $5,370,960, because the sixty-three sixty-nine schools surveyed represented only one-fourth of all schools; and

WHEREAS, during the 1996-1997 school year, students in secondary schools lost more than 16,000 textbooks. The Department of Education, on the other hand, collected only $168,906 in cash from students for the loss of these 16,000 textbooks; and

WHEREAS, assuming the average cost of a secondary school textbook during the 1996-1997 school year to be $35 to $40, the cost of replacing these 16,000 middle and high school textbooks would be $560,000 to $640,000 in 1997 dollars—a difference of $391,094 to $471,094; and

WHEREAS, chapter 8-57, Hawaii Administrative Rules (Department of Education), holds students accountable for lost and damaged textbooks, and defines consequences for students with outstanding financial obligations who do not make restitution by the end of the current school year; and

WHEREAS, chapter 8-57, Hawaii Administrative Rules, allows students who are financially unable to pay the replacement cost of lost and damaged textbooks to participate in a work program designed by the principal and agreed to by the student and parents or guardians; and

WHEREAS, textbooks are crucial to learning and teaching in western civilization because ours is a written tradition—not an oral one. This was true in ancient times—as evidenced by clay tablets and papyrus scrolls, and is true today—as evidenced by the Hawaii Content and Performance Standards II and its rubrics; and

WHEREAS, the Legislature, the Governor, and the Board of Education cannot be expected to make informed decisions concerning the appropriation, allotment, and allocation of moneys for textbooks without a multi-year textbook acquisition/replacement "master" plan that is based on instructional needs of all two hundred sixty-one schools in the State; now, therefore,

BE IT RESOLVED by the House of Representatives of the Twenty-first Legislature of the State of Hawaii, Regular Session of 2001, that the Board of Education, through the Superintendent of Education, is requested to withhold funds for textbook acquisition/replacement from schools that are not in compliance with Board of Education Policy No. 2240 concerning instructional materials; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the Board of Education is requested to amend chapter 8-57, Hawaii Administrative Rules, to:

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the Board of Education is requested to delegate the day-to-day responsibility for monitoring and enforcing school-level compliance with its many policies, including Policy No. 2240 concerning instructional materials, to the Superintendent of Education; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the Board of Education is requested to consider school-level compliance with its policies as one measure of the Superintendent of Education's overall effectiveness as a manager and leader of principals and state and district administrators; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the Board of Education –through the Superintendent of Education—is requested to conduct regular audits of, and submit reports to the Legislature on, schools' compliance with Board of Education Policy No. 2240, not less than twenty days prior to the convening of each regular session from 2002 to 2006; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that certified copies of this Resolution be transmitted to the Governor, Chairperson of the Board of Education, the Commander in Chief, United States Pacific Command, and the Superintendent of Education, who in turn is requested to transmit copies to the principal of every public school in the State.