While anti-immigration bills flood the 2011 legislative agenda, several education-related bills ranging from concealed carry of handguns on campus to textbook affordability made it into the list of nearly 400 pre-filed bills on Monday. With a long way to go before enacted as law — though a better conservative climate could hardly be imagined — the proposed legislation highlights the direction state lawmakers intend to steer Texas education.

In a bold move, state Rep. Fred Brown (R-Bryan) proposes abolishing the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board and transferring the board’s functions to the Texas Education Agency, which currently deals with K-12 public education. The nine-member coordinating board advises legislators on higher education issues and recommends funding formulas for universities and community colleges.

“It would be a more seamless transitions for high school students going into college,” Brown said. “As a state we need to think about educating students from the cradle to college; not just from K-12 but K-16.”

Brown said today 70 percent of high school graduates need some type of remedial education before starting a college career. Moving the THECB under one agency would streamline the process for students while also saving the state money, he said.

Under Brown’s House Bill 104, the State Board of Education would provide oversight of the newly formed entity, a potential move that could raise some eyebrows. Despite harsh criticism directed at the board in recent years, Brown is confident the 15-member body will serve well.

“They are smart people,” he said. “They have to have a passion for what they do or else they wouldn’t run for office in first place.”

Brown also authored HB 106 that would redraw school district boundaries along county lines, so that each county in the state contained only one school district.

In an effort to alleviate college finances, state Rep. Dan Branch (R-Dallas), who serves as chairman of the Texas House Higher Education Committee, introduced a bill aimed at increasing textbook affordability at public universities and colleges. Branch’s HB 33 would require the retail cost of textbooks to accompany course schedules in order for students to gauge book prices before registering for classes. If enacted, the bill would also encourage schools to notify students about lower-cost textbook alternatives, as well as make sure publishers give the option of unbundled textbooks, omitting costly supplements like CDs that may be unnecessary.

Newly elected Republican state Rep. David Simpson of Longview pre-filed a bill that would permit gun holders to carry concealed weapons on college campuses. Simpson, who also has a bill out that would prohibit state’s indirect or direct support for abortions, told the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal that in light of the recent high-profile suicide of Colton Tooley on The University of Texas at Austin campus, his piece of legislation was “overdue”.

Simpson’s HB 86 is similar 2009′s failed concealed-carry bill authored by state Rep. Joe Driver (R-Garland) and state Sen. Jeff Wentworth (R-San Antonio), which ignited a firestorm of support and dissent from both sides of the spectrum. Simpson’s bill has the potential to be one of the most controversial of the education-related bills this session.

Texas Sen. Judith Zaffirini (D-Laredo) crafted a number of education-related Senate bills, including measures that would add new academic requirements to the TEXAS Grant scholarship program (Senate Bill 28), assess the effectiveness of higher education academic advising (SB 36), include for-profit private post-secondary schools in the higher education accountability system (SB 38) and improve the student loan process (SB 40).

With HB 224, pre-filed on Tuesday, state Rep. Mark Strama (D-Austin) hopes to enforce annual staff training that includes preventing and responding to incidents of bullying and ‘cyberbullying’ in the classroom. He defines the latter as bullying though electronic media, which can still be considered an offense if communicated off-campus, “if the conduct interferes with a student’s educational opportunities.”

Strama moves to amend the education code to make sure students who are victims of or have engaged in bullying are able to transfer classes or schools at the request of their parents. It would also require principals to notify parents of bullying no later than two days after the incident, with the exception of a superintendent-approved waiver in the event a victim doesn’t want his/her parent to be notified.

(Photo: Flickr Creative Commons/Editor B, Image by Matt Mahurin)