Bill > SB5179

This bill establishes a comprehensive complaint process for addressing willful noncompliance with certain state education laws, focusing on protecting students' health, safety, and civil rights. The Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction (OSPI) will create a process to investigate two types of complaints: limited complaints (affecting individual students) and broad complaints (impacting entire student bodies, schools, or districts). Complainants must first exhaust existing local complaint procedures and can include students, parents, guardians, or community members. If OSPI finds willful noncompliance, the school district must develop a compliance action plan, conduct public hearings, and may face consequences such as policy readoption, potential disciplinary action against superintendents, or as a last resort, withholding up to 20% of state education funds. The bill defines "willful noncompliance" as intentional violations of laws related to civil rights, discrimination, harassment, curriculum requirements, student discipline, and other critical areas. The process applies to traditional public schools, charter schools, and state-tribal education compact schools, emphasizing accountability while maintaining a commitment to local educational control and providing a mechanism for addressing serious systemic education law violations.