BILL ANALYSIS Ó
AB 2491
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CONCURRENCE IN SENATE AMENDMENTS
AB 2491 (Blumenfield)
As Amended August 6, 2012
Majority vote
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|ASSEMBLY: |46-26|(May 3, 2012) |SENATE: |25-13|(August 20, |
| | | | | |2012) |
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Original Committee Reference: ED.
SUMMARY : Requires the State Board of Education (SBE), upon the
next revision of the Gifted and Talented Education (GATE)
program criteria, to adopt a standard for pupil identification
to ensure the identification procedures of an applicant school
district provide economically disadvantaged pupils and pupils of
varying cultural backgrounds with full participation in the GATE
programs.
The Senate amendments delete the Assembly version of this bill,
and instead require, upon the next revision of the GATE program
criteria, the SBE to adopt a standard for pupil identification
to ensure the identification procedures of an applicant school
district provide economically disadvantaged pupils and pupils of
varying cultural backgrounds with full participation in the
programs.
AS PASSED BY THE ASSEMBLY , this bill prohibited a school
district's application for a proposed GATE program to be
approved by the SBE, for a period of more than one year unless
the application describes the process used by the school
district to identify for eligibility in the program, pupils of
ethnic minorities and pupils of diverse socio-economic status.
FISCAL EFFECT : According to the Senate Appropriations
Committee, minor workload increase for the SBE to adopt a new
standard.
COMMENTS : Background on GATE: According to the California
Department of Education (CDE), the GATE program provides funding
for local education agencies (LEAs) to develop unique education
opportunities for high-achieving and underachieving pupils in
California public elementary and secondary schools who have been
identified as gifted and talented. Special efforts are made to
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ensure that pupils from economically disadvantaged and varying
cultural backgrounds are provided with full participation in
these unique opportunities. LEAs may establish programs for
GATE pupils consisting of special day classes, part-time
groupings, and cluster groupings. GATE programs are operated in
approximately 800 school districts located in all 58 counties.
There are over 480,000 public school students that have been
identified as gifted and talented in the state.
According to the author, it is crucial that we provide an
appropriate education for gifted children living in
disadvantaged situations. While many parents can afford to
provide extracurricular enrichment for their gifted children,
low-income parents lack the resources to provide these
opportunities. If schools also lack the funds necessary to
identify and appropriately educate our gifted low-income youth,
the gifts and talents of these children may never be realized.
The reasons are varied for the under-identification of gifted
and talented students who are poor or do not speak English.
Parents may be so stretched financially that opportunities for
enrichment and development are almost non-existent, and school
staff may base their judgments in part on the benefits of such
enrichment. The focus on English language acquisition may
obscure the recognition of high intelligence or talent.
Cultural differences or poverty may preclude some parents from
active involvement in the schools and from helping their
children access appropriate programs. The Los Angeles Unified
School District (LAUSD) has a large concentration of low-income
and minority students and the GATE program is notoriously
homogenous and concentrated in the higher-income student
population, for various reasons including access and cultural
differences. The goal of this bill is to encourage better
integration of those students who are not in the GATE program
but would otherwise qualify.
Demographics in GATE: Below is a chart that illustrates the
demographic differences between the general student population
in California and the student population identified for GATE.
The chart shows an over-identification of White, Asian and
Filipino students and an under-identification of Hispanic and
African American students in the GATE program statewide.
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| |GATE Student | Statewide |
| | Population | Student |
| | | Population |
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|-------------------+-------------+---------------|
|Hispanic or Latino | 30.6% | 51.4% |
| | | |
|-------------------+-------------+---------------|
|White | 40.0% | 26.6% |
|-------------------+-------------+---------------|
|Asian | 17.8% | 8.5% |
|-------------------+-------------+---------------|
|Filipino | 4.3% | 2.6% |
|-------------------+-------------+---------------|
|African American | 4.0% | 6.7% |
|-------------------+-------------+---------------|
|American Indian or | 0.6% | 0.7% |
|Alaska Native | | |
|-------------------+-------------+---------------|
|Pacific Islander | 0.6% |0.6% |
| | | |
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(Source: California Department of Education 2010-11 Data)
Funding Flexibility: There are approximately 60 categorical
programs that serve specific goals or specific programs. The
fiscal year (FY) 2009-10 budget had an important impact on
categorical programs. The budget agreement imposed a 20%
reduction on 39 programs and gave LEAs that received those funds
in FY 2007-08 the flexibility to use the funds for any
educational purposes from FY 2008-09 through FY 2012-13. This
flexibility was extended to FY 2014-15 by SB 70 (Budget
Committee), Chapter 7, Statutes of 2011. This reduction and
flexibility provision is commonly known as "Tier 3" flexibility,
which essentially gives LEAs $4.5 billion in additional
unrestricted funds. Tier 1 protected four categorical programs
from cuts and flexibility while 11 categorical programs
sustained reductions but were given no flexibility under Tier 2.
For Tier 3 funds, school districts receive their allocations
for five years based on the applicable percentage the programs
received in FY 2007-08. As a result, until 2015, LEAs are not
required to justify or report average daily attendance (ADA) in
order to receive the specified categorical funds. GATE is one
of the categorical programs included in Tier 3 flexibility,
therefore, districts are not required to submit an application
to the CDE for approval and the SBE is not required to update
the program criteria. Current law requires the SBE to review
the criteria at least once every four years, however, due to
Tier 3 flexibility, the standards were last revised in 2005.
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This means this bill would not be implemented until Tier 3
flexibility expires in 2014-15, or later if it is extended
again, but would likely be revised as soon as Tier 3 flexibility
ends.
Analysis Prepared by : Chelsea Kelley / ED. / (916) 319-2087
FN: 0004601