A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
AN ACT directing the joint legislative education oversight committee to study the need to raise the compulsory school attendance age.
The General Assembly of North Carolina enacts:
SECTION 1.  The Joint Legislative Education Oversight Committee shall perform a comprehensive study of the need to raise the compulsory school attendance age.  In the course of the study, the Committee shall consider:
(1)	The impact of dropping out on the student;
(2)	The capacity of a 16‑year‑old to understand the social and economic consequences of dropping out of school;
(3)	The emergence of major high school reform efforts, including Learn and Earn Programs, the New Schools Initiative, and 21st Century Schools, and the impact they may have on teenagers who remain in school longer;
(4)	The importance to the entire State of every student leaving high school prepared to enter the workforce or succeed in higher education;
(5)	Research on factors related to students' success in school;
(6)	Strategies, programs, and support services that should be provided if the compulsory school attendance age is raised to enable students to graduate from high school, and time lines for implementing those strategies, programs, and support services;
(7)	Related laws and policies that must be addressed to ensure the availability of support services for students;
(8)	The fiscal impact of raising the compulsory attendance age;
(9)	Possible exemptions from the law for certain students; including those students who fulfill their graduation requirements early and receive a diploma, complete an alternative education program, or whose parents consent to their leaving school before they graduate or reach the maximum compulsory school attendance age;
(10)	The fiscal impact on the Department of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention and the Department of Correction;
(11)	The law in other states and the experience of other states that have raised the compulsory school attendance age; and
(12)	Input from school personnel and from dropouts and students at risk of dropping out on the issue.
The Joint Legislative Education Oversight Committee shall report the results of its study and its recommendations to the 2007 General Assembly.
SECTION 2.  This act is effective when it becomes law.