SENATE BILL REPORT
SB 5120
As of January 21, 2025
Title: An act relating to expanding the learning assistance program.
Brief Description: Expanding the learning assistance program.
Sponsors: Senators Nobles, Riccelli, Hasegawa, Lovelett, Salomon and Wilson, C.; by request of Superintendent of Public Instruction.
Brief History:
Committee Activity: Early Learning & K-12 Education: 1/23/25.
Brief Summary of Bill
  • Increases Learning Assistance Program (LAP) allocations for high-poverty schools from 1.1 to 1.6 hours per week.
  • Creates a tiered model for LAP allocations for high-poverty schools beginning in the 2026-27 school year.
SENATE COMMITTEE ON EARLY LEARNING & K-12 EDUCATION
Staff: Alex Fairfortune (786-7416)
Background:

The prototypical school funding model allocates Learning Assistance Program (LAP) funding to provide supplemental instruction and services to students who are not meeting academic standards. The funding is represented as 2.3975 additional instructional hours per week for a class of 15 students, and is based on the percentage of students eligible for free or reduced-price meals (FRPM) in the prior school year or the year immediately preceding the district's participation in the federal Department of Agriculture's Community Eligibility Provision (CEP). Additional funding of 1.1 instructional hours per week is provided for students in qualifying high-poverty school buildings, which are schools in which 50 percent or more of students qualify for FRPM based on a three-year rolling average or schools that met that standard in the year immediately preceding the district's participation in the CEP. School districts must distribute the high poverty-based allocation to the schools that generated the funding.
Summary of Bill:

The LAP allocations for high-poverty schools are increased from 1.1 to 1.6 hours per week in additional instruction.

?

Beginning in the 2026-27 school year the high-poverty LAP allocations are adjusted to follow a tiered model. Tiers are determined based on the three-year rolling average enrollment that qualifies for FRPM, as follows:

  • Tier 1 schools with a FRPM percentage at or exceeding 70 percent receive funding for 2.2 hours of extra instruction per week;
  • Tier 2 schools with a FRPM percentage between 50 and 69.9 percent receive funding for 1.6 hours of extra instruction per week; and
  • Tier 3 schools with a FRPM percentage between 30 and 49.9 percent receive funding for 0.4 hours of extra instruction per week.

?

Provisions allowing a school to qualify in the year immediately preceding its participation in the CEP are struck and added to a temporary provision that is applicable through the 2025-26 school year.
Appropriation: None.
Fiscal Note: Available.
Creates Committee/Commission/Task Force that includes Legislative members: No.
Effective Date: Ninety days after adjournment of session in which bill is passed.