Rand pulls back on community service bill

Senate Majority Leader Tony Rand said he won't pursue this session legislation that would require students attending public and private colleges in North Carolina to spend at least 20 hours a semester tutoring or mentoring public school students.

Rand said he would try to rework his bill for next year after hearing a lot of concern from college officials. He said he wants it to be more "volunteer oriented" and not something that creates a new bureaucracy for volunteerism.

"It would require a great deal of planning," said Rand, a Fayetteville Democrat.

Rand filed his bill after two college students were recently killed by gunfire in the Triangle: UNC-Chapel Hill student body president Eve Carson and Duke University graduate student Abhijit Mahato. The community service program would be named after them.

It would have required most students entering UNC system schools and private colleges in the fall to begin volunteering. Private colleges would have had to participate or lose out on two state financial aid programs.

By Jan. 1, 2012, all bachelor's degree recipients would have had to have completed the community service requirement.