Bill 328.

Summary.

The bill proposes to regulate parents’ direct participation in their children’s education and their institutional participation through parents’ associations. It covers public and private schools. Staff of the Ministry of Education (Ministerio de Educación), regional education offices, local education management units, and schools would support the associations without interfering in their activities, except where those activities endanger the institution’s normal operation. Exercise of the right to conscientious objection would be excluded from that exception.

Each school would have one association, formed at the initiative of parents or guardians of enrolled students, with the school administration required to assist in convening them. The association would be based at the school and would be a nonprofit private legal entity. Its organization would be governed by the Organic Education Law (Ley Orgánica de Educación), the bill, and its internal rules, with the Civil Code (Código Civil) applying where appropriate as supplementary law. Associations could form federations and national groupings, which would obtain legal personality through registration with the Public Registry (Registro Público). Parents could join without discrimination on the grounds listed in the bill. When parents cannot assume that responsibility, they could appoint a guardian or another connected person. Guardians would attend to students’ educational progress and maintain communication and cooperation with the school.

The associations’ powers include assisting with educational activities, promoting inclusion of students with disabilities, monitoring materials and resources, seeking food, health, and sports programs, receiving administrative information, and reporting irregularities. In public schools, their representatives would participate in the School Education Project, budgeting, and monitoring enrollment, attendance, and teaching hours. In private schools, associations would coordinate changes to tuition, uniform, and school supply costs with the Ministry of Education and take part in assessing new programs. Their purposes also include cooperation between home and school, parent training, support for student organizations, and promotion of child protection instruments ratified by the Republic of Panama (República de Panamá).

The bill distinguishes active and honorary members and requires a General Assembly (Asamblea General), Council of Delegates, Board of Directors, and Oversight Council. The General Assembly would approve accounts, the budget, the education plan, dues, bylaws, and specified decisions on property, offices, and dissolution. It would meet in ordinary session at least once a year within the first two (2) months. Articles 12 to 16 also govern notices, representation, quorums, voting, and challenges to decisions. Guardians would have to show that their financial obligations to the association are current to vote.

The Council of Delegates would include two (2) representatives from each classroom, elected for one (1) school year within the first four (4) weeks of the school year. It would elect the Board of Directors and help prepare and carry out plans and activities; its decisions could be appealed to the General Assembly. The Board of Directors would serve as the executive body. Delegates would elect its members for terms set in the bylaws, subject to the bill’s limits. The bill also sets procedures for vacancies, meetings, and decisions, eligibility and incompatibility rules for board members, and grounds for leaving office. Its provisions concern the Ministry of Education, the General Assembly, and the Public Registry, as well as families, students, teachers, administrative staff, and public and private schools.