M E M O R A N D U M

TO: All High School Principals

THRU: Dr. Scott Muri, Deputy Superintendent of Academics

FROM: Candace Ford, Executive Director CPSW

Tessa Barbazon, Program Administrator, School Counseling email: [email protected] phone: (470) 254-0449

DATE: May 15, 2015

SUBJECT: House Bill 91 Petitions

ACTION: Understand the District Process for Filing a House Bill 91 Petition

House Bill 91 was signed into law on March 30, 2015, and gives former FCS students the opportunity to petition the local school district to receive their high school diploma if all required coursework for graduation was completed and the student only lacked passing scores on the graduation test(s) mandated for the year of expected graduation. As a result, the district has developed on online petition process for students to apply to receive a diploma (this applies to students from 1981-2014). The district’s office of school counseling will lead a summer project to process petitions filed from May 15th-August 31st, 2015. The process will shift to local high schools beginning September 1st, 2015. All high school head counselors will receive training on how to process petitions in August 2015. Currently, head counselors have been instructed to send the attached information to individuals that have contacted the school. Any student who attended your school in 2014-2015, but is not currently enrolled and received a certificate of attendance, may submit a petition to the counseling department and be approved to receive a diploma without submitting an online petition. Any student that is presently enrolled and attending your school does not have to submit a petition.

Please post the House Bill 91 Petition link to your school website: https://www3.fultonschools.org/hb91/home/index2 by May 22nd, 2015.

C: Executive Staff Area Superintendents