JBC instructs staff to draft bill tying part‑time enrichment pay to counted hours
March 23, 2026 | 2026 Legislature CO, Colorado
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The Joint Budget Committee directed staff to draft legislation changing how the state pays for part‑time enrichment students so that payments reflect the hours the student is scheduled: quarter‑time attendance would receive quarter pay, and half‑time attendance would continue to receive half‑time pay.
Andrea Ewell (JBC staff) summarized audits and State Board presentations showing enrollment in part‑time enrichment programs more than doubled since fiscal 2019, and that the state currently pays about $100 million a year through the school finance formula for these students. Ewell said many counts are at the statutory minimum—90 hours per year—and that auditors found schedules that looked primarily like sports, field trips, or other activities not aligned with full instructional programming. "CDE's issue is that right now, due to a lack of rules around this, the rulemaking really has not kept pace with the innovation that CDE is seeing in these types of programs," Ewell said.
Members debated tradeoffs: some raised concerns about rural or special‑needs programs that legitimately rely on part‑time models; others said paying multiple times more per hour for students who are not full‑time public school students is unfair during tight budgets. Vice Chair Bridges and others argued the State Board should set clear guidance about what counts as an instructional hour; the committee voted 5‑0 (with one member excused) to draft a bill that creates a quarter‑time category and directs the State Board to promulgate guardrails to define eligible hours.
The committee also instructed staff to consider whether to include an explicit statutory timeline or other enforcement mechanisms to ensure faster State Board action, and to return with draft language for the committee to review.
Next steps: staff will draft legislative language that ties payment rates to counted hours and will work with the State Board office on potential rule‑making timelines and statutory guardrails.
Andrea Ewell (JBC staff) summarized audits and State Board presentations showing enrollment in part‑time enrichment programs more than doubled since fiscal 2019, and that the state currently pays about $100 million a year through the school finance formula for these students. Ewell said many counts are at the statutory minimum—90 hours per year—and that auditors found schedules that looked primarily like sports, field trips, or other activities not aligned with full instructional programming. "CDE's issue is that right now, due to a lack of rules around this, the rulemaking really has not kept pace with the innovation that CDE is seeing in these types of programs," Ewell said.
Members debated tradeoffs: some raised concerns about rural or special‑needs programs that legitimately rely on part‑time models; others said paying multiple times more per hour for students who are not full‑time public school students is unfair during tight budgets. Vice Chair Bridges and others argued the State Board should set clear guidance about what counts as an instructional hour; the committee voted 5‑0 (with one member excused) to draft a bill that creates a quarter‑time category and directs the State Board to promulgate guardrails to define eligible hours.
The committee also instructed staff to consider whether to include an explicit statutory timeline or other enforcement mechanisms to ensure faster State Board action, and to return with draft language for the committee to review.
Next steps: staff will draft legislative language that ties payment rates to counted hours and will work with the State Board office on potential rule‑making timelines and statutory guardrails.
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