(a) The exchange of teachers with a foreign country pursuant to this article shall be conditioned upon the fact that the employing school district in California shall not be required to pay the salary of the teacher from the foreign country. Teachers employed by California school districts shall, while serving as teachers in a foreign country pursuant to this article, continue to receive from their employing school districts the full amounts of the regular salaries that would be payable to them if they were serving in the schools of the particular employing school districts, and the school district shall make all deductions provided by law for retirement purposes during that period.
(b) The department may pay to the teachers from a foreign country employed by a school district in California pursuant to this article, part or all of the difference between the salary being paid to them by their respective foreign employers and the salary being paid by the California school district to the particular teachers with whom they are exchanged, as the department shall determine to be appropriate in each instance, except that no payment for these purposes to a foreign teacher shall exceed three thousand dollars ($3,000) in one school year, nor shall payments for these purposes be made to more than 500 teachers from foreign countries in any one fiscal year.
(c) The department may pay the travel expenses of teachers in the exchange program but those payments shall not be made to more than 500 California teachers and 500 teachers from foreign countries in any one fiscal year, and those payments shall be for the actual expense involved in travel to and from the exchange assignments or for one thousand dollars ($1,000), whichever is the lesser amount.
(d) The commission shall establish minimum standards for credentials for exchange teachers from a foreign country and shall provide for the issuance of credentials to those teachers.
(Amended by Stats. 2024, Ch. 471, Sec. 22. (SB 1329) Effective January 1, 2025.)