Pupils: extracurricular activities: work permits.

(1) Existing law requires the governing board of a school district that maintains one or more schools containing any of grades 7 to 12, inclusive, to establish a policy regarding participation in extracurricular and cocurricular activities by pupils in those grades as a condition for the receipt of specified school funding allocations. Existing law requires the policy to condition pupil participation in extracurricular and cocurricular activities upon satisfactory educational progress in the previous grading period. Existing law authorizes the governing board of each school district to adopt, as part of the policy, provisions that would allow a pupil who does not achieve satisfactory educational progress in the previous grading period to remain eligible to participate in extracurricular and cocurricular activities during a probationary period that does not exceed one semester in length. Existing law prohibits a pupil who does not achieve satisfactory educational progress during the probationary period from participating in extracurricular and cocurricular activities in the subsequent grading period. This bill would authorize the governing board of each school district to adopt a policy that would allow a probationary period to exceed one semester in length through the completion of the 2020–21 school year due to the impact of COVID-19. (2) Existing law prohibits a person, firm, or corporation from employing, suffering, or permitting any minor under 18 years of age to work in, or in connection with, any establishment or occupation without a permit to employ, issued by the proper educational officers, except as specified. Existing law authorizes, among others, the superintendent of a school district, a county superintendent of schools, and the chief executive officer of a charter school to issue a work permit to a minor, subject to specified requirements and conditions. Existing law prohibits issuance of a work permit to a minor until the minor accompanied by the minor's parent or guardian appears before the person authorized to issue the permit and makes application therefor. This bill would authorize issuance of a work permit in the absence of the appearance of the minor and the minor's parent or guardian under specified conditions. The bill would authorize documentation required for purposes of issuance of a work permit to a minor to be submitted electronically during an extended school closure due to a natural disaster, pandemic, or other emergency. The bill would prohibit a work permit from being denied based on a pupil's grades, grade point average, or school attendance when the pupil's school has been physically closed for an extended time due to a natural disaster, pandemic, or other emergency. (3) This bill would declare that it is to take effect immediately as an urgency statute.