BILL ANALYSIS Ó
AB 224
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ASSEMBLY THIRD READING
AB 224 (Bonilla)
As Amended May 27, 2011
Majority vote
EDUCATION 7-3 APPROPRIATIONS 12-5
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|Ayes:|Brownley, Ammiano, |Ayes:|Fuentes, Blumenfield, |
| |Buchanan, Butler, Carter, | |Bradford, Charles |
| |Eng, Williams | |Calderon, Campos, Davis, |
| | | |Gatto, Hall, Hill, Lara, |
| | | |Mitchell, Solorio, |
| | | | |
|-----+--------------------------+-----+--------------------------|
|Nays:|Norby, Halderman, Wagner |Nays:|Harkey, Donnelly, |
| | | |Nielsen, Norby,Wagner |
| | | | |
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SUMMARY : Requires the Superintendent of Public Instruction
(SPI), in consultation with the State Board of Education (SBE),
to incorporate both previously specified and additional measures
of performance into the Academic Performance Index (API), using
the best available data and commencing in fiscal year (FY)
2012-13. Specifically, this bill :
1)Deletes the requirement that attendance rates be incorporated
into the API.
2)Requires the SPI, in consultation with the SBE, to incorporate
into the API by FY 2012-13, for schools with any of grades 8
through 12, each of the following indicators using the best
available data; also requires the SPI to derive these measures
as specified.
a) High school graduation rates as defined in current law;
b) The rates at which pupils complete a course of study
that fulfills University of California and California State
University admission requirements; and,
c) The rates at which pupils complete a course of study
that provides the skills and knowledge necessary to attain
entry-level employment upon graduation from high school.
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3)Requires the API advisory committee to provide recommendations
for the implementation of these provisions, and to develop
recommendations for the inclusion of multiple measures in the
API of middle and junior high schools.
EXISTING LAW requires the SPI to develop the API to measure the
performance of schools, and to include a variety of indicators
in that measure, including, but not limited to, achievement test
results, attendance rates, and graduation rates.
FISCAL EFFECT : According to the Assembly Appropriations
Committee:
1)General Fund (GF) administrative costs to the SPI, likely less
than $300,000, to collect indicators regarding entry-level
employment. These costs include collecting the information,
coordination with other state departments, and constructing a
data system that allows for the transfer of information.
These costs may be reduced to the extent that the California
Longitudinal Pupil Achievement Data System (CALPADS) is able
to collect information.
2)To the extent that local education agencies (LEAs) do not
already collect this data, there are potential, unknown GF,
Proposition 98 costs, of at least $50,000, to LEAs to collect
data.
COMMENTS : Pursuant to SB 1 X1 (Alpert), Chapter 3, Statutes of
1999-2000, First Extraordinary Session, the SPI established an
advisory committee to advise the SPI and the SBE on the creation
of the API, and developed (with the approval of the SBE) the API
to measure the performance of schools, using a variety of
indicators, including, achievement test results, attendance
rates, and graduation rates. Currently only achievement test
results are incorporated into the API. Having an API that
focuses solely on achievement test results may be too narrow in
that it does not reflect information about other student
outcomes (e.g., dropout and graduation rates, college readiness,
preparation for the workplace) that are important as measures of
the performance of districts, schools and subgroups. In
addition, focusing solely on test scores may actually lead to
conclusions that are incorrect; as a perverse example, a school
that sees an increase in the number of students dropping out
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could easily see a resulting increase in test scores, and thus
in the API for that school or district (if the students dropping
out tended to have below average test scores), yet most would
agree that this increase in test scores and API are not
reflective of an improvement in performance or the quality of
education in that school or district. The solution to this
problem would be to broaden the set of measures that are
composited to form the API. The Legislature foresaw this when
it initially authorized the development of the API to be an
index (i.e., a composite number reflecting a number of component
measures) based on data from multiple measures, including
achievement test results, attendance rates, and graduation
rates.
Though inclusion of graduation rates in the API is current law,
authority was provided to the SPI to determine when data on
graduation rates would be included in the API; at this point in
time, test scores remain as the only data on which the API is
based. In fact, this bill, by requiring the inclusion of
graduation rates by 2012-13, only makes the inclusion of a
currently required component of the API time certain. In
addition, information on student course-taking that fulfills
university admission requirements is already measured and
reported annually on the School Accountability Report Card that
is constitutionally required of every school and district in the
state. This bill also provides detailed direction on the
measurement of the extent to which schools offer a course of
study that provides the skills and knowledge necessary to attain
entry-level employment.
In addition, this bill proposes to delete the current
requirement that attendance rates for pupils be included in the
API. All other data elements currently included in the API, as
well as those proposed by this bill, focus on education
outcomes; attendance rates do not measure outcomes, instead they
are more a measure of input and thus are different from other
measures included in the API.
Analysis Prepared by : Gerald Shelton / ED. / (916) 319-2087
FN: 0001091
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