BILL ANALYSIS
SENATE COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION
Gloria Romero, Chair
2009-2010 Regular Session
BILL NO: AB 81
AUTHOR: Audra Strickland
AMENDED: April 14, 2009
FISCAL COMM: No HEARING DATE: June 17, 2009
URGENCY: No CONSULTANT: Lynn Lorber
SUBJECT : Interscholastic athletics: foster youth.
SUMMARY
This bill requires that a foster child who changes
residences pursuant to a court order or decision of a child
welfare worker to be immediately deemed to meet all
residency requirements for participation in interscholastic
sports or other extracurricular activities.
BACKGROUND
Current law:
1) Provides that all children in foster care have the
right to attend school and participate in
extracurricular activities, consistent with the
child's age and developmental level.
2) Requires educators, county placing agencies, care
providers, advocates, and the juvenile courts to work
together to maintain stable school placements and to
ensure that each pupil in foster care is placed in the
least restrictive educational programs, and has access
to the academic resources, services, and
extracurricular and enrichment activities that are
available to all pupils.
The California Interscholastic Federation (CIF) is a
voluntary organization through which member high schools
may mutually adopt rules and regulations relating to
interscholastic athletics in grades 9 through 12. CIF
bylaws establish residential eligibility requirements for
interscholastic athletic participation. A pupil remains
eligible to participate in interscholastic sports when he
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or she changes schools with a "valid change of residence"
by the pupil's parents, guardians, or caregiver. A valid
change of residence is determined upon certain facts,
including, that the pupil's "entire immediate family must
make the change and take with them the household goods and
furniture appropriate to the circumstances."
Pupils can obtain a "hardship waiver" if there is "an
unforeseeable, unavoidable and uncorrectable act, condition
or event, that causes the imposition of a severe and
non-athletic burden upon the student or his/her family." A
hardship waiver may be granted only if the conditions of
the hardship are met, and there is sufficient documentation
to support the hardship claim.
ANALYSIS
This bill requires that a foster child who changes
residences, as specified, to be immediately deemed to meet
all residency requirements for participation in
interscholastic sports or other extracurricular activities.
Specifically, this bill:
1) Requires that a foster child who changes residences
pursuant to a court order or decision of a child
welfare worker to be immediately deemed to meet all
residency requirements for participation in
interscholastic sports or other extracurricular
activities.
2) Clarifies that extracurricular and enrichment
activities that foster and homeless youth are to have
access to include, but are not necessarily limited to,
interscholastic sports administered by the California
Interscholastic Federation.
STAFF COMMENTS
Need for the bill . In October of 2008, the California
Interscholastic Federation (CIF) Sac-Joaquin Section
determined that a high school pupil who had been in foster
care since birth and had moved from Vallejo to Auburn to
live in a foster care placement with his aunt and joined
the football team had not been eligible to play in the
first five games of the football season at Placer High
School (PHS) because he had not submitted the "hardship
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waiver" paperwork required by CIF bylaws. Consequently,
PHS's football team was forced to forfeit league wins they
had earned, thus disqualifying the team from the playoffs.
The PHS student challenged the CIF's decision in the
Superior Court in Alameda County, and on November 24, 2008,
the Court held in Dyer v. California Interscholastic
Federation, et al, Alameda County Superior Court Case No.
RG08421517, that the CIF's bylaws violated numerous
provisions of California law and the state Constitution
(equal protection). The Court found that the CIF bylaws
violate the rights of foster youth to participate in age
appropriate extracurricular activities and school
activities, as well as provisions of the Education Code
that ensure foster youth have the same access to
educational and extracurricular opportunities as other
pupils.
CIF is in the process of amending its bylaws and
constitution to address the issue of residential
eligibility for foster youth. Consistent with this bill,
CIF Bylaw 206 establishing residential eligibility, as
proposed to be amended by CIF, will stipulate that a
student in foster care who has changed residences pursuant
to a court or a social worker order shall be immediately
residentially eligible for interscholastic athletics
provided all other CIF rules and regulations are met.
CIF's Federated Council approved these amendments to the
bylaws and constitution at the May, 2009 meeting of the
Council. These changes will take effect on July 1, 2009.
Given this, the Committee may wish to consider if this bill
is necessary.
SUPPORT
All Saints Church Foster Care Project
California Communities United Institute
County Welfare Directors Association of California
Kern County Superintendent of Schools
Los Angeles County Office of Education
State Public Affairs Committee of the Junior Leagues of
California
OPPOSITION
None received.
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