STAND. COM. REP. NO. 332

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE:    S.B. No. 778

       S.D. 1

Honorable Donna Mercado Kim

President of the Senate

Twenty-Eighth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2015

State of Hawaii

Madam:

     Your Committees on Hawaiian Affairs and Education, to which was referred S.B. No. 778 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO EDUCATION,"

beg leave to report as follows:

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to require the Department of Education to establish procedures to develop an assessment of statewide performance standards for students in the Kaiapuni program.

     Your Committees received testimony in support of this measure from the Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Department of Education, Hawaiian Affairs Caucus – Democratic Party of Hawaii, King Kamehameha Hawaiian Civic Club, Kalihi Kalama Hawaiian Civic Club, Keaukaha Community Association, and fourteen individuals. 

Your Committees received comments on this measure from four individuals.

     Your Committees find that this measure will provide for a fairer and more reasonable assessment of students in the Kaiapuni program.  In a counterpart to this measure, the House of Representatives adopted language developed and proposed by the Office of Hawaiian Affairs and the Department of Education.

     Your Committees have amended this measure by:

     (1)  Making the changes proposed by the Office of Hawaiian Affairs and adopted by the House Committee on Ocean, Marine Resources, and Hawaiian Affairs in H.B. No. 874, H.D. 1, which:

          (A)  Requires the Department of Education to develop and implement the annual assessments in the Hawaiian language; and

          (B)  Requires the Department of Education, with the assistance of specified entities, to establish procedures for the development of annual assessments in the Hawaiian language; and

     (2)  Making technical, nonsubstantive amendments for the purposes of clarity and conformity.

     As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Hawaiian Affairs and Education that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 778, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 778, S.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Ways and Means.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Hawaiian Affairs and Education,

____________________________ MICHELLE N. KIDANI, Chair

____________________________ MAILE S.L. SHIMABUKURO, Chair