LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST


AB 8, as amended, Brownley. Public schools: Race to the Top.
(1) The federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009
(ARRA), provides $4.3 billion for the State Incentive Grant Fund
(Race to the Top Fund), which is a competitive grant program designed
to encourage and reward states that are implementing specified
educational objectives. The ARRA requires a Governor to apply on
behalf of a state seeking a Race to the Top grant, and requires the
application to include specified information. The United States
Secretary of Education has issued regulations and guidelines
regarding state eligibility under the Race to the Top program.
This bill would state the intent of the Legislature, as well as
findings and declarations of the Legislature relating to the Race to
the Top program. This bill would authorize the Superintendent of
Public Instruction to enter into a memorandum of understanding with a
local educational agency that is consistent with the requirements
established by the bill and the regulations and guidelines for the
Race to the Top program.
This bill would require the state plan or plans submitted to the
United States Secretary of Education for the Race to the Top program
to meet specified substantive and procedural requirements. The bill
would also require the Department of Finance to provide appropriate
policy and fiscal committees of the Legislature with a copy of the
plan or plans within 10 days of submission to the United States
Secretary of Education for the Race to the Top program. The
Department of Finance, in conjunction with the Superintendent, would,
within 30 days of receipt of any federal Race to the Top program
funds, and prior to their allocation, be required to develop and
submit to the appropriate policy and fiscal committees of the
Legislature an expenditure plan, as specified.
This bill would require the Superintendent, on or before January
1, 2011, to contract with an independent evaluator relating to the
implementation of the state plan to be submitted in application for a
Race to the Top Fund competitive grant award. This bill would
require the Superintendent, on or before September 1, 2010, to
convene a working group consisting of specified members to develop
parameters of the evaluation and make specified recommendations
relating to the selection of the independent evaluator. This bill
would require the Superintendent, on or before June 1, 2014, to
provide the final evaluation to the Legislature, the Governor, and
the state board, and authorize the department to use federal Race to
the Top program funds for this evaluation.
This bill would provide that the evaluation provisions shall
become inoperative on July 1, 2014, and as of January 1, 2015, are
repealed unless a later enacted statute becomes operative, as
specified.
(2) The Public Schools Accountability Act of 1999 requires the
Superintendent, with approval of the state board, to develop the
Academic Performance Index (API), consisting of a variety of
indicators, to be used to measure the performance of schools.
Existing law requires the Superintendent to develop, and the state
board to adopt, expected annual percentage growth targets for all
schools based on their API baseline score and prescribes a minimum
percentage growth target of 5% annually. The act also establishes the
Immediate Intervention/Underperforming Schools Program (IIUSP).
Schools that score below the 50th percentile on certain achievement
tests are invited to participate in the program and are provided
program funding. Twenty-four months after receiving IIUSP funding, a
school that fails to meet its growth targets each year, but
demonstrates significant growth, as determined by the state board,
continues to participate in the program for an additional year and to
receive funding. If a school fails to meet its growth targets each
year and does not demonstrate significant growth, it is deemed a
state-monitored school and the Superintendent is required to take
specified actions with regard to the school.
This bill would require the Superintendent to apportion federal
Race to the Top program funds pursuant to a specified expenditure
plan for low-achieving schools. The bill, commencing with the 2011-12
fiscal year, would require the Superintendent to apportion block
grant funds based on the number of certificated personnel employed in
eligible school districts that have one or more schools under their
jurisdiction and charter schools, that are low-achieving, as defined.
School districts and charter schools that receive funds pursuant to
these provisions would be required to expend the funds for specified
purposes relating to professional development for teachers,
administrators, and schoolsite staff. School districts and charter
schools receiving funds also would be required to annually report
specified information to the State Department of Education relating
to the expenditure of these funds.
This bill would require the Superintendent to establish a list of
persistently lowest-achieving schools, as defined, according to
specified criteria. The bill , except as specified, would
require the governing board of a school district, county office of
education, or charter school to implement, for any school identified
by the Superintendent as persistently lowest-achieving, one of four
interventions for turning around lowest-achieving schools described
in federal regulations and guidelines for the Race to the Top
program, thereby imposing a state-mandated local program. The bill
would authorize a persistently lowest-achieving school implementing
specified intervention models to participate in a school-to-school
partnership program by working with a mentor school that has
successfully transitioned from a low-achieving school to a
higher-achieving school. The regional consortia authorized under a
specified statute would, using specified federal funds, be required
to provide, in collaboration with the department, at a minimum,
technical assistance and support to local educational agencies with
one or more persistently lowest-achieving schools to assist with the
implementation of the duties specified for any of the 4
interventions.
This bill would require the governing board of a local educational
agency, with regard to any school identified as low-achieving, as
defined, but not identified as persistently lowest-achieving, as
defined, which continues to fail to make adequate yearly progress
under the federal Elementary and Secondary Education Act after one
full school year, and where at least one-half of the parents or
guardians of pupils attending the school and the elementary or middle
schools that normally matriculate into a middle or high school, as
applicable, sign a petition requesting the local educational agency
to implement a strategy to reform that school, to (a) place that
request as an item on the agenda of a regularly scheduled public
hearing no later than 90 days following receipt of that request, (b)
hear that agenda item at that regularly scheduled meeting, and (c)
allow public testimony and comment on that agenda item.
(3) Existing law requires the governing board of a school district
to develop and adopt objective evaluation and assessment guidelines
for certificated employees.
This bill would require each participating local educational
agency that executes a memorandum of understanding with the State of
California pursuant to the federal Race to the Top program to have in
place or establish a rigorous, transparent, and fair evaluation
system for its school principals.
(4) Existing law requires the Controller, in consultation with the
Department of Finance and the State Department of Education, to
develop a plan to review and report on financial and compliance
audits. Existing law requires the Controller to propose the content
of an audit guide and authorizes a supplement to the audit guide to
be suggested in the audit year to address issues resulting from new
legislation in that year that changes the conditions of
apportionment. Existing law requires the Controller to submit the
proposed content of the audit guide and any supplement to the
Education Audits Appeal Panel for review and possible amendment, and
requires the Education Audits Appeal Panel to adopt the audit guide
and any supplement pursuant to the rulemaking procedures of the
Administrative Procedure Act.
This bill would require the Controller to propose, and the
Education Audits Appeal Panel to adopt, a charter school supplement
to the audit guide in order to provide guidance to auditors regarding
which sections of the school district and county office audit guide
apply to charter schools and to create specific guidance related to
the unique nature of charter schools. The bill also would make
conforming changes.
The Charter Schools Act of 1992 (Charter Schools Act) authorizes
any one or more persons to submit a petition to the governing board
of a school district to establish a charter school that operates
independently from the existing school district structure as a method
of accomplishing specified goals. The act limits the maximum number
of charter schools authorized to operate in the state each year, as
specified.
This bill would delete that numerical limitation.
The Charter Schools Act specifies the procedures for the
submission, review, and approval or denial of a petition to establish
a standard or countywide charter school. The act
authorizes the governing board of a school district to deny a charter
petition only if the board makes written factual findings that
support certain facts regarding the petition.
This bill, in addition, would authorize a governing board to deny
a petition to establish a standard or countywide charter school
if it makes a written factual finding that other charter
schools in operation for at least 3 consecutive years and operated by
the petitioner have met any of the following criteria: (A) the
charter school has demonstrated academic achievement equivalent to a
persistently lowest-achieving school, as specified; (B) the charter
school has not been renewed; (C) the school has had its
charter revoked completed its first renewal cycle and
was not renewed by the authorizing entity, the county board of
education, or the state board, as applicable; or C) the school has
had its charter revoked, and the charter was not restored by the
county board of education or the state board, as applicable .
The Charter Schools Act limits the duration of charters to a
period not to exceed 5 years and authorizes the chartering authority
to grant one or more subsequent renewals for an additional period of
5 years. The act specifies the criteria a charter school is required
to meet in order to receive a renewal of its charter. Commencing
January 1, 2005, or after a charter school has been in operation for
4 years, whichever date occurs later, the act requires a charter
school to meet at least one of several specified criteria prior to
receiving a charter renewal, including a determination by the entity
that granted the charter that the academic performance of the charter
school is at least equal to the academic performance of the public
schools that the charter school pupils would otherwise have been
required to attend, as well as the academic performance of the
schools in the school district in which the charter school is
located, taking into account the composition of the pupil population
that is served at the charter school.
This bill would delete that criterion and replace it with a
criterion relating to attaining positive growth on the charter school'
s API score. The bill would require a chartering authority,
consistent with the federal Race to the Top guidelines, to consider
the degree to which a charter school serves pupil populations that
are similar to local district pupil populations, especially relative
to high-need pupils. The bill would prohibit a chartering authority
from granting a renewal of a charter school for longer than a 3-year
period if that charter school is in program improvement or if a
charter school is in year 5 of program improvement, except as
specified.
The Charter Schools Act requires a charter petition to include a
reasonably comprehensive description of the manner in which annual,
independent financial audits will be conducted. The act requires a
charter school to transmit a copy of its annual, independent
financial audit report for the preceding fiscal year to its
chartering entity, the Controller, the county superintendent of
schools of the county in which the charter school is sited, except as
specified, and the department by December 15 of each year.
This bill would require the Controller, by December 31 of each
fiscal year, to publish a directory of certified public accountants
and public accountants deemed by the Controller to be qualified to
conduct audits of charter schools. The bill would require each audit
of a charter school to be conducted by a certified public accountant
or public accountant selected by the charter school from the
directory. The bill would specify that it is unlawful for a public
accounting firm to provide audit services to a charter school if the
lead audit partner, or coordinating audit partner, having primary
responsibility for the audit, or the audit partner responsible for
reviewing the audit, has performed audit services for that charter
school in each of the 6 previous fiscal years, except as provided.
(5) Existing law, the Leroy Greene California Assessment of
Academic Achievement Act (hereafter the Greene Act), requires the
Superintendent to design and implement a statewide pupil assessment
program, and requires school districts, charter schools, and county
offices of education to administer to each of its pupils in grades 2
to 11, inclusive, certain achievement tests, including a
standards-based achievement test pursuant to the Standardized Testing
and Reporting (STAR) Program.
This bill would require the Superintendent to develop
recommendations for the reauthorization of the statewide pupil
assessment program that include a plan for transitioning to a system
of high-quality assessments, as defined. This bill would require the
advisory committee that is established to advise the Superintendent
and the state board on specified matters relating to the Public
School Performance Accountability Program to make recommendations by
January 1, 2011, to the Legislature, the Governor, and the state
board on, among other things, the establishment of a methodology of
generating a measurement of group and individual academic performance
growth by utilizing individual pupil results from a longitudinally
valid achievement assessment system, as specified.
The Greene Act requires the Superintendent to adopt statewide
content and performance standards in the core curriculum areas of
reading, writing, mathematics, history/social science, and science,
as specified. The Greene Act authorizes the state board to modify any
proposed content standards or performance standards prior to
adoption, and to adopt content and performance standards in
individual core curriculum areas as those standards are submitted to
the state board.
This bill would eliminate this authority and instead require the
Superintendent, to develop a set of academic content standards in
language arts and mathematics. The standards would be required to
meet specified criteria. The Superintendent, on or before August 2,
2010, would be required to present these standards to the state
board, and to present to the Governor, and the appropriate policy and
fiscal committees of the Legislature, specified information relating
to these standards. The state board, on or before September 1, 2010,
would be required to adopt or reject the standards, as specified.
The bill would require the Superintendent to participate in the
Common Core State Standards Initiative consortium sponsored by the
National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School
Officers and or any associated or
related interstate collaboration to jointly develop common
high-quality standards or assessments aligned with the
common set of standards developed by that consortium
. The bill also would make conforming changes.
Existing law makes certain provisions of that act inoperative on
July 1, 2011, and repeals all of the act's provisions on January 1,
2012.
The bill would make the act inoperative on July 1, 2012, and would
repeal the act as of January 1, 2013, except specified provisions,
which would become inoperative on July 1, 2016, and would be repealed
as of January 1, 2017. By extending the time period during which
school districts are required to perform various duties related to
the administration of achievement tests, the bill would impose a
state-mandated local program.
(6) The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse
local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the
state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that
reimbursement.
This bill would provide that, if the Commission on State Mandates
determines that the bill contains costs mandated by the state,
reimbursement for those costs shall be made pursuant to these
statutory provisions.

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Comments/questions on ABX5 8 (Brownley): Public schools: Race to the Top.