A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
AN ACT to require all students who receive a high school diploma endorsement to demonstrate a certain level of reading achievement.
The General Assembly of North Carolina enacts:
SECTION 1.  G.S. 115C‑12(40) reads as rewritten:
"(40)	To Establish High School Diploma Endorsements. – The State Board of Education shall establish, implement, and determine the impact of adding (i) college, (ii) career, and (iii) college and career endorsements to high school diplomas to encourage students to obtain requisite job skills necessary for that student to be successful in a wide range of high‑quality careers and to reduce the need for remedial education in institutions of higher education. These endorsements shall reflect courses completed, overall grade point average, reading achievement, and other criteria as developed by the State Board of Education. For the purposes of awarding any of the high school diploma endorsements, the State Board shall require students to have received on a nationally norm‑referenced college admissions test for reading, either administered under G.S. 115C‑174.11(c)(4) or as an alternative nationally norm‑referenced college admissions test approved by the State Board, at least the benchmark score established by the testing organization that represents the level of achievement required for students to have approximately a fifty percent (50%) chance of obtaining a grade B or higher or a seventy‑five percent (75%) chance of obtaining a grade C or higher in a corresponding credit‑bearing first‑year college course. A student may retake a nationally norm‑referenced test as many times as necessary to achieve the required benchmark score for reading in order to receive a high school diploma endorsement prior to the student's exit from high school. The State Board of Education shall report annually to the Joint Legislative Education Oversight Committee on (i) the impact of awarding these endorsements on high school graduation, college acceptance and remediation, and post‑high school employment rates, (ii) the number of students who had to retake a nationally norm‑referenced college admissions test to meet the reading benchmark score required by this subdivision, and (iii) the number of students who were not awarded a high school diploma endorsement solely because of the inability to meet the benchmark score for reading as required by this subdivision."
SECTION 2.  This act is effective when it becomes law and applies beginning with high school diploma endorsements awarded in the 2018‑2019 school year.