BILL ANALYSIS                                                                                                                                                                                                    Ó



                                                                  AB 409 
                                                                  Page  1

          Date of Hearing:   May 18, 2011

                        ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
                                Felipe Fuentes, Chair

                    AB 409 (Alejo) - As Amended:  March 14, 2011 

          Policy Committee:                              Education 
          Vote:7-3

          Urgency:     No                   State Mandated Local Program: 
          No     Reimbursable:              No

           SUMMARY  

          This bill authorizes the State Department of Education (SDE) to 
          make a standards-aligned primary language assessment available 
          to school districts and charter schools to assess their 
          non-English language learner (ELL) pupils who are enrolled in a 
          dual language immersion (DLI) program and requires a district or 
          charter school that chooses this option to administer the 
          assessment at its own expense.  

           FISCAL EFFECT  


          1)Minor GF/98 cost pressure, likely less than $75,000, to 
            authorize school districts to assess their non-ELL pupils who 
            are enrolled in DLI programs, as specified.  This bill 
            requires school districts to pay for the administration of 
            this assessment at their own expense.  According to SDE, it 
            allocated approximately $101,000 GF/98 to school districts for 
            the administration of the primary language assessment to ELL 
            pupils in 2010.  



          2)The 2010 Budget Act allocated a total of $53.6 million for the 
            Standardized Testing and Reporting program, which includes the 
            standards-aligned primary language assessment.  Of this 
            amount, $42.2 million are GF/98 funds and $11.4 are federal 
            Title VI funds, which can be used for purpose related to 
            implementing standards and assessments.  










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          3)The 2010 Budget Act allocated $168.2 million in federal Title 
            III funding for the purpose of ensuring ELL pupils, including 
            immigrant children and youths, attain English proficiency and 
            meet the same challenging academic content standards that 
            other students are expected to meet.   According to SDE, 119 
            (53%) DLI programs used federal Title III to operate these 
            programs.  It is likely these programs would utilize their 
            Title III funds to assess non-ELL pupils utilizing the primary 
            language standards-based assessment, as specified.  


           COMMENTS  

           1)Background  .  SB 1448 (Alpert), Chapter 233, Statutes of 2004, 
            and SB 755 (Poochigian), Chapter 676, Statutes of 2005, 
            authorized the SDE to develop and adopt a standards-aligned 
            primary language assessment in reading language arts and 
            mathematics for ELL pupils to replace the existing primary 
            language assessment (Aprenda 3) on a grade by grade basis 
            until July 1, 2011. For example, if a reading language arts 
            standards-aligned primary language test is developed for grade 
            2, Aprenda 3 would be eliminated only for grade 2 in that 
            subject. 


            The Spanish California Standards Test (CST) was developed for 
            this purpose.  To date, there are Spanish CSTs available for 
            ELL pupils enrolled in grades 2-11 in ELA and for ELL pupils 
            enrolled in grades 2-7 in mathematics.  Also, Spanish CSTs are 
            available for ELL pupils enrolled in algebra I and geometry.  
            Statute authorizes an ELL pupil to take a primary language 
            CST.  The pupil, however, is required to take this assessment 
            in addition to all CSTs in English for specified subjects 
            (i.e., ELA, mathematics, history/social science, and science). 
             According to SDE, 43,194 ELL pupils took the Spanish CSTs in 
            English language arts and 36,346 ELL pupils took the Spanish 
            CST for mathematics in 2010.  



           2)Purpose  .  Current law only authorizes ELL pupils enrolled in 
            school less than 12 months or who receive primary language 
            instruction, as specified, to take the standards-aligned 
            primary language assessment. However, there are approximately 








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            50,000 California students enrolled in dual language immersion 
            programs. A dual language immersion program integrates ELL and 
            native English speaking students to develop bilingualism and 
            biliteracy in English and another language. This prohibition 
            limits the information available to school districts, the 
            state, and parents regarding the effectiveness of dual 
            language immersion programs for native English speaking 
            students. 



            According to the author, "Schools are prohibited by law from 
            using the Spanish CST on the non-ELL pupil subset of the 
            student population.  Dual immersion schools are therefore 
            unable accurately measure the proficiency of their English 
            Only or fluent English proficient students. This puts these 
            schools at a disadvantage because they cannot compare the data 
            between ELL and non-ELL pupils. As a result, they lack the 
            information needed to accurately measure student progress in 
            grade level content standards and make academic improvements 
            in instruction."



           3)DLI program information  .  According to the SDE, 224 DLI 
            programs were operating in 101 school districts in California 
            in 2008.  Of these programs, 203 (90%) provided instruction in 
            Spanish.  



           4)Amendments  .  While it is important to ensure English-only 
            speaking pupils enrolled in DLI programs have access to a 
            primary language CST, some educators argue redesignated 
            fluent-English proficient (RFEP) pupils should also be 
            authorized to take this assessment.  A pupil is designated 
            RFEP because he or she was recently reclassified as fluent in 
            English.  ELL advocates and parents argue it is important to 
            be able to assess an RFEP pupil's academic content knowledge 
            and an English-only CST may not provide an accurate picture, 
            particularly if the pupil was recently reclassified.  The 
            author may wish to consider amending this measure to authorize 
            school districts to administer the primary language CST to 
            RFEP pupils.   









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           5)Related legislation  .  AB 250 (Brownley), pending in this 
            committee, contains language similar to this measure.  The 
            main purpose of AB 250 is to implement the Common Core 
            Standards in English and mathematics; as such it does contain 
            language to reauthorize the state's assessment system, 
            including the primary language CSTs.   



           6)Previous legislation  .  AB 252 (Coto), similar to this measure, 
            was vetoed by Governor Schwarzenegger in October 2007 with the 
            following message: 


            "English-speaking pupils who have voluntarily enrolled in dual 
            language immersion programs are currently required to take the 
            California Standards Test in English. Therefore, another 
            assessment is not needed to measure their mastery of 
            state-adopted academic content standards in another language. 
            Furthermore, I am concerned that this bill creates significant 
            General Fund cost pressures for the state to develop 
            standards-aligned primary language tests in other languages. 
            Given the state's current fiscal climate it is not prudent for 
            me to enact this measure."


           Analysis Prepared by  :    Kimberly Rodriguez / APPR. / (916) 
          319-2081