End of Open Enrollment in Oregon

Explanation :

In the 2011 legislative session, House Bill 3681 written as, "Allows student to attend school in school district where student does not have legal residence if student receives written consent from district where school is located." was introduced to and passed the Oregon House, passed the Oregon Senate and was signed into law. (https://gov.oregonlive.com/bill/2011/HB3681/) .

See FAQ of HS 3681 from ODE: https://www.oregon.gov/ode/educator-resources/2012fallconference/hb3681interdistricttransfers.pdf

According to the Oregon Department of Education website:

Open Enrollment, enacted by the Oregon Legislature in 2011, created an additional option for students wishing to transfer between districts. The open enrollment statute contains a sunset provision, effective July 1, 2019.

What this means for districts and students:

• 2018-19 was the last school year for students to transfer under this law.
• Any student who transferred to a new district through open enrollment prior to the 2019-20 school year gets to stay in that district. The open enrollment statute contains language specifically stating that the sunset does not affect the status of a person who transferred via open enrollment prior to the 2019-20 school year.
• Because 2018-19 was the last year for transfer, districts should not go through the open enrollment procedure in the spring of 2019 and cannot enroll students through open enrollment in 2019-20.

The Legislature may choose to extend the sunset during the 2019 legislative session. However, until the Legislature takes action, the sunset is still in effect and districts may not enroll new students through open enrollment.

(https://www.oregon.gov/ode/schools-and-districts/Pages/transfers-between-districts.aspx)

Implications:

• "Because 2018-19 was the last year for transfer, districts should not go through the open enrollment procedure in the spring of 2019 and cannot enroll students through open enrollment in 2019-20." (as quoted above from ODE website)
• For districts such as Corbett who enroll out-of-district students, this will mean Corbett School District cannot enroll new students through open enrollment in 2019-2020, and in years to come unless the legislature changes.
• Students who are already enrolled from out-of-district are allowed to stay enrolled in Corbett School District.
• An attrition of the student population of CSD will begin to take place, starting next school year (2019-2020) because CSD will not be allowed to enroll new out-of-district students. As students graduate or choose to leave, future class sizes will become smaller and overall school population will become smaller. CSD will be allowed to continue enrolling new in-district students.
• The only legal option for out-of-district students to enroll in Corbett besides going to a public charter school, is to have inter-district transfer agreements with other districts. Thus, allowing them to release families whom want to come to CSD. This may happen in some cases of "hardship", though is unlikely to happen on a large scale because releasing students from districts also means releasing that funding to go elsewhere.
• Currently the student population of CSD is 1,222. Approximately, 650 are in-district students and 572 are enrolled from out-of-district.
• There are financial implications for the district with the attrition of the student population.
• During the potential period of “declining enrollment”, the District would receive funding for the student population from the previous year “Extended ADM” (the larger population number) until the point when/if the District experienced an increase in student population. At that point, the District would once again be funded at the actual student population.
• The attrition of the student population would happen over time, not allowing CSD to retain the flexibility to control district enrollment numbers.
• CSD and the school board are discussing and looking into the options of becoming a public charter school because this would allow the district to continue enrolling students from outside of the school district and retain the flexibility to control the enrollment numbers. As a charter school, Corbett would become a "choice school" which both in-district and out-of-district students would apply to attend. Under Oregon Charter statute, in-district students are given priority for enrollment spots and then out-of-district. (See Public Charter Schools Information page for further explanation and references)