BILL NUMBER: AB 36 CHAPTERED 07/14/03 CHAPTER 45 FILED WITH SECRETARY OF STATE JULY 14, 2003 APPROVED BY GOVERNOR JULY 14, 2003 PASSED THE ASSEMBLY JUNE 30, 2003 PASSED THE SENATE JUNE 27, 2003 AMENDED IN SENATE JUNE 17, 2003 AMENDED IN ASSEMBLY FEBRUARY 24, 2003 INTRODUCED BY Assembly Member Wyland DECEMBER 2, 2002 An act to amend Section 52056 of the Education Code, relating to academic achievement. LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST AB 36, Wyland. Pupil achievement. Existing law requires each school district, charter school, and county office of education to administer to each of its pupils in grades 2 to 11, inclusive, designated achievement tests. Existing law establishes the Public Schools Accountability Act of 1999 and requires the Superintendent of Public Instruction to develop an Academic Performance Index (API), which consists in part of the results of the tests administered pursuant to the Standardized Testing and Reporting (STAR) Program, to measure the performance of schools and to rank schools based on the value of the API. Existing law requires schools to report their ranking, including a description of the components of the API, in their annual school accountability report card and requires the governing board of each school district to discuss the results of the annual ranking at the next regularly scheduled meeting following the annual publication of the API and school rankings by the Superintendent of Public Instruction. This bill would encourage the governing board of a school district to discuss STAR test scores and to analyze the results of those assessments. The bill would authorize the governing board of a school district with a school not meeting a certain specified standard to conduct an assessment and adopt an improved performance plan. THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA DO ENACT AS FOLLOWS: SECTION 1. Section 52056 of the Education Code is amended to read: 52056. (a) The High Achieving/Improving Schools Program is hereby established. Commencing in June 2000, and every June thereafter, the Superintendent of Public Instruction, with approval of the State Board of Education, shall rank all public schools based on the Academic Performance Index established pursuant to Section 52052. The schools shall be ranked by the value of the API in decile categories by grade level of instruction provided and shall include three categories: elementary, middle, and high school. The schools shall also be ranked by the value of the API when compared to schools with similar characteristics. Commencing in June 2001, the Superintendent of Public Instruction shall also report the target annual growth rates of schools and the actual growth rates attained by the schools. For purposes of this section, similar characteristics include, but are not limited to, the following characteristics, insofar as data is available from the State Department of Education's data: pupil mobility, pupil ethnicity, pupil socioeconomic status, percentage of teachers who are fully credentialed, percentage of teachers who hold emergency credentials, percentage of pupils who are English language learners, average class size per grade level, and whether the schools operate multitrack year-round educational programs. The Superintendent of Public Instruction shall annually publish these rankings on the Internet. (b) All schools shall report their ranking, including a description of the components of the API, in their annual school accountability report card pursuant to Sections 33126 and 35256. (c) Following the annual publication of the API and school rankings by the Superintendent of Public Instruction, the governing board of each school district shall discuss the results of the annual ranking at the next regularly scheduled meeting. The governing board is strongly encouraged to include in the discussion an examination by school, grade, and subgroup enumerated by and in accordance with subclause (II) of clause (v) of subparagraph (C) of paragraph (2) of subsection (b) of Section 6311 of Title 20 of the United States Code, of scores on the tests administered pursuant to the Standardized Testing and Reporting (STAR) Program set forth in Article 4 (commencing with Section 60640) of Chapter 5 of Part 33. (d) If the average STAR test score of the school is below the 50th percentile, or if the test scores of more than 25 percent of the pupils of a school are below the 50th percentile, the school district governing board may do both of the following: (1) Conduct an assessment of the reasons for the performance results of the school, by grade. (2) Adopt an improved performance plan that includes methods determined by the district to have been used by schools with similar pupil populations elsewhere in the district or state and significantly higher pupil scores. If it is deemed not feasible to adopt those methods, the plan shall explain why an alternate approach is preferable. If a school district governing board adopts an improved performance plan, it shall reevaluate the plan at each future annual meeting described by subdivision (c), until STAR test scores reach a level above those specified in this subdivision.