SB365

SB365 lets Texas public colleges offer a broader academic fresh start, but it does not require every college to use a five-year cutoff. Existing law lets a Texas resident seeking undergraduate admission elect not to have coursework from 10 or more years before the starting semester considered. SB365 lets an institution disregard a more recent additional period too, but not credits or grades earned during the preceding five years. The institution’s policy determines how far it uses that option. Final law; Existing fresh-start framework.

There is a tradeoff: if a college uses the expanded period, it must disregard all credits and grades from that period and cannot award credit for those courses. An applicant cannot keep only the good credits while dropping only the bad grades within that period. The existing rule also denies credit for the older coursework excluded under the original 10-year fresh start. Ordinary admissions criteria still apply; a fresh-start election is not guaranteed admission or erasure of every record for every purpose.

Each public institution must adopt a fresh-start admissions policy, post it on its website and submit it to the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board. The policy must state the period of coursework considered. The bill was signed and took effect May 6, 2025; the admissions changes apply beginning with fall 2025. Official history; Policy and application dates.

The bill also updates the excess-credit-hours calculation used for state funding: for a student in a fresh-start bachelor’s program, previously earned hours disregarded under the institution’s policy are excluded from that calculation, not only hours at least 10 years old. The change applies to funding recommendations for the biennium starting September 1, 2025 for students entering these programs in fall 2025 or later. Earlier entrants remain under the prior funding rule. It does not promise a new scholarship or automatic financial-aid eligibility. Existing funding provision; Funding amendment and transition.