Establishing an agriculture education grant program within the department of education and making appropriations

This bill establishes an agriculture education grant program within the department of education (DE) to expand student access to instruction related to agriculture, food, and natural resources.20 (career and technical agriculture education), and “personal services costs” as the costs associated with a school district employing a teacher for a maximum of days of additional instruction outside of the teacher’s regularly scheduled teaching duties to provide instruction in an agriculture education program. The bill authorizes school districts to apply to DE for grants under the program to offset the personal services costs associated with employing teachers to provide instruction in an agriculture education program. The department of education may award a grant to a school district under the program totaling 100 percent of the teacher’s personal services costs if the school district’s agriculture education program has existed for less than consecutive years and totaling percent of the teacher’s personal services costs for all other programs. School districts must use these moneys to supplement, not supplant, existing public funding used by a school district for similar purposes. The bill establishes an agriculture education grant program fund in the state treasury. The bill requires DE to develop and make available to school districts a statewide system to track the time teachers devote to instruction facilitated by grants provided under the program. The bill requires the state board of education to adopt rules to administer the program.