22-8-2. Definitions.
838 words·~4 min read·
/nm/chapter-22-public-schools/article-8-public-school-finance/22-8-2·A research copy — for the controlling text, always check the official state or federal source. Not legal advice.
As used in the Public School Finance Act:
A. "ADM" or "MEM" means membership;
B. "membership" means the total enrollment of qualified students on the current roll of a class or school on a specified day. The current roll is established by the addition of original entries and reentries minus withdrawals. Withdrawals of students, in addition to students formally withdrawn from the public school, include students absent from the public school for as many as ten consecutive school days; provided that withdrawals do not include students who are in need of intervention or who are chronically or excessively absent;
C. "basic program ADM" or "basic program MEM" means the MEM of qualified students but excludes the full-time-equivalent MEM in early childhood education and three- and four-year-old students receiving special education services;
D. "cost differential factor" is the numerical expression of the ratio of the cost of a particular segment of the school program to the cost of the basic program in grades four through six;
E. "department" or "division" means the public education department;
F. "early childhood education ADM" or "early childhood education MEM" means the full-time-equivalent MEM of students attending approved early childhood education programs;
G. "family income index rate" means the percentage of students in a school district or charter school that is identified as either extremely low income or very low income by the family income index;
H. "full-time-equivalent ADM" or "full-time- equivalent MEM" is that membership calculated by applying to the MEM in an approved public school program the ratio of the number of hours per school day devoted to the program to six hours or the number of hours per school week devoted to the program to thirty hours;
I. "operating budget" means the annual financial plan and educational plan required to be submitted by a local school board or governing body of a state-chartered charter school;
J. "performance measure" means a quantitative indicator used to assess the output or outcome of an approved program;
K. "performance target" means the expected level of performance of a program's performance measure;
L. "program cost" is the product of the total number of program units to which a school district is entitled multiplied by the dollar value per program unit established by the legislature;
M. "program element" is that component of a public school system to which a cost differential factor is applied to determine the number of program units to which a school district is entitled, including MEM, full-time-equivalent MEM, teacher, classroom or public school;
N. "program unit" is the product of the program element multiplied by the applicable cost differential factor;
O. "public money" or "public funds" means all money from public or private sources received by a school district or state-chartered charter school or officer or employee of a school district or state-chartered charter school for public use;
P. "qualified student" means a public school student who:
(1)has not graduated from high school;
(2)is regularly enrolled in one-half or more of the minimum course requirements approved by the department for public school students; and
(3)in terms of age and other criteria:
(a)is at least five years of age prior to 12:01 a.m. on September 1 of the school year;
(b)is at least three years of age at any time during the school year and is receiving special education services pursuant to rules of the department;
(c)except as provided in Subparagraph
(d)of this paragraph, has not reached the student's twenty-second birthday on the first day of the school year; or
(d)has reached the student's twenty-second birthday on the first day of the 2019-2020 school year, is counted in a school district's or charter school's MEM on the third reporting date of the 2018-2019 school year, has been continuously enrolled in the same public school since that reporting date and is still enrolled in that school;
Q. "rural population rate" means that proportion of the total population within a school district's geographic boundaries that lives in a rural area and not in an urban area as defined by the United States census bureau;
R. "staffing cost multiplier" means the teacher cost index; and
S. "state superintendent" means the secretary of public education or the secretary's designee.
History: 1953 Comp., § 77-6-2, enacted by Laws 1967, ch. 16, § 56; 1969, ch. 180, § 3; 1971, ch. 263, § 3; 1972, ch. 17, § 1; 1974, ch. 7, § 1; 1974, ch. 8, § 1; 1977, ch. 83, § 1; 1977, ch. 246, § 62; reenacted by Laws 1978, ch. 128, § 3; 1980, ch. 151, § 46; 1983, ch. 301, § 68; 1985, ch. 93, § 1; 1986, ch. 33, § 13; 1988, ch. 64, § 13; 1995, ch. 69, § 1; 1997, ch. 40, § 2; 2004, ch. 27, § 21; 2005, ch. 260, § 1; 2006, ch. 94, § 2; 2009, ch. 193, § 1; 2018, ch. 55, § 1; 2019, ch. 206, § 6; 2019, ch. 207, § 6; 2025, ch. 89, § 1.