FOR AN ACT ENTITLED, An Act to  create a mentor teacher pilot program and to appropriate money therefor.
BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF SOUTH DAKOTA:
     Section  1.  There is hereby appropriated from the general fund the sum of one hundred thousand dollars ($100,000), or so much thereof as may be necessary, to the Department of Education and Cultural Affairs for a mentor teacher pilot program.
     Section  2.  The secretary of the Department of Education and Cultural Affairs shall approve vouchers and the state auditor shall draw warrants to pay expenditures authorized by this Act.
     Section  3.  Any amounts appropriated in this Act not lawfully expended or obligated by June   30, 2003, shall revert in accordance with §  4-8-21.
     Section  4.  There is hereby created in the Department of Education and Cultural Affairs a mentor teacher program. The program will be administered by the Department of Education and Cultural Affairs in conjunction with the South Dakota School Administrators Association and the South Dakota Education Association.
     Section  5.  Funding provided in this Act will provide for two mentor teachers and up to fifty

teachers to be mentored.
     Section  6.  For purposes of this Act, eligible teachers for mentoring will be teachers in their first year of teaching, or teachers entering the teaching profession through an alternative route of certification.
     Section  7.  For purposes of this Act, to be a mentor teacher a teacher must have a minimum of ten years of teaching experience and have a current South Dakota teaching certificate.