BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SENATE COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION
Carol Liu, Chair
2013-14 Regular Session
BILL NO: AB 1159
AUTHOR: Blumenfield and Bloom
INTRODUCED: February 22, 2013
FISCAL COMM: Yes HEARING DATE: June 12, 2013
URGENCY: No CONSULTANT:Lenin Del Castillo
SUBJECT : Charter schools: Pupil achievement data.
SUMMARY
This bill requires the State Department of Education to
provide individual pupil demographic, program, and
achievement data, including test scores and unique pupil
identification numbers, relating to pupils who attend a
charter school for which a school district is the
chartering authority in accordance with the federal Family
Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA).
BACKGROUND
Existing law specifies that a school district may provide
statistical data to a public agency or entity, private
nonprofit college, university, or educational research and
development organization, as long as no pupil may be
identified from the data. (Education Code § 49076)
Existing law requires every pupil to have an individual
record of accomplishment by the end of grade 12 that
includes the results of achievement tests administered as
part of the Standardized Testing and Reporting (STAR)
Program, the results of end-of-course exams, and any
vocational education certification exams a pupil may have
taken. Existing law specifies that a pupil's record of
accomplishment is private and may not be released to any
person other than the pupil's parent or guardian, or a
teacher, counselor, or administrator directly involved with
the pupil, without the express written consent of either
the parent or guardian if the pupil is a minor, or the
pupil if the pupil has reached the age of majority or is
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emancipated.
(Education Code § 60607)
Existing law specifies that individual test results from
the STAR program may only be released with the permission
of either the pupil's parent or guardian, or the pupil if
the pupil has reached the age of majority or is
emancipated.
(Education Code § 60641)
Under existing federal law, FERPA generally prohibits the
improper disclosure of personally identifiable information
derived from education records. FERPA applies to all
educational agencies and institutions that receive funding
under any program administered by the U.S. Department of
Education. Under FERPA, schools are required to provide
certain privacy protections for the educational records
they maintain.
Existing law requires a charter school to meet at least one
of the following performance standards in order to be
renewed: (1) attainment of the school's Academic
Performance Index (API) growth target in two of the last
three years or in the aggregate last three years; (2) an
API decile ranking of four or better in the prior year or
in two of the last three years; (3) a Similar Schools API
ranking of four or better in two of the last three years;
(4) academic performance that is at least equal to the
academic performance of the public schools that the charter
school pupils would otherwise been required to attend; or
(5) qualification for participation in the Alternative
School Accountability Model (ASAM). (Education Code §
47607)
ANALYSIS
This bill :
1) Requires the State Department of Education (SDE) to
provide to a school district individual pupil
demographic data, program data, and achievement data,
including but not limited to, the results of the
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standards-based achievement tests that are part of the
Standardized Testing and Reporting (STAR) Program, the
English Language Development Test, and the California
High School Exit Exam, relating to pupils who attend a
charter school for which the school district is the
chartering authority, as specified.
2) Requires the SDE to provide this data, to the extent
it is available, along with the unique pupil
identification number of each of those pupils, to the
school district in accordance with the Family
Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA).
STAFF COMMENTS
1) Need for the bill : Although charter schools are
exempt from most laws governing school districts and
schools, they are required to participate in the STAR
program and report the results of tests in that
program to the SDE. Some charter schools report the
information through the school district that
authorized the school, while others report the
information directly to SDE. When a charter school
reports the data directly to SDE, the information is
not available to the school district. According to
the author's office, a school district that wishes to
obtain student-level achievement data for students who
attend a direct-reporting charter school must make
individual requests from each school, costing time and
resources that the school district cannot afford,
especially for school districts with a high number of
charter schools.
AB 1159 seeks to expedite the process in which school
districts seek pupil achievement data so that they may
be able to identify learning disparities in the
communities they serve.
2) Records privacy . Although current law allows a school
district access to aggregate school-level data,
existing law deems a pupil's individual assessment
data, including Standardized Testing and Reporting
(STAR) Program results to be private and precludes the
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release of those data to anyone other than specified
individuals. In 2010, the Los Angeles Unified School
District (LAUSD) requested student-level assessment
data for pupils attending charter schools that it
authorized from the State Department of Education
(SDE). In October 2012, the Superintendent of Public
Instruction denied the request stating "Because of the
legal restrictions imposed on the release of
student-level assessment data, SDE is unable to
fulfill your current request."
According to the LAUSD, "Access to individual student
demographic and achievement data is important to
assess how students are faring." The LAUSD states
that "Given that school districts are responsible for
renewing school charter agreements, access to pupil
data for a district's charter is necessary to properly
evaluate the performance of students at the charter
school. Without this information, it is difficult for
districts to know if the charter is meeting the needs
of all of its students." They maintain that this bill
will enable districts to maintain better oversight of
the charter schools they authorize.
3) Academic Performance Index . The Academic Performance
Index (API) is a single number on a scale of 200 to
1,000 that is an annual measure of test score
performance in schools. The API is used to summarize
the performance of students and a school, and is based
on results of the STAR program and the California High
School Exit Examination. The system is based on a
two-year cycle that gives a "base" score for the first
year and a "growth" score in the second year. The
Base API is released in the spring and is derived from
the previous spring's test scores. The Growth API,
which is released in the fall, comes from the previous
spring's test scores. The State Board of Education
has established a statewide target of 800 for the API.
Schools with API scores below 800 are expected to
improve and are given a "growth target" that is 5
percent of the difference between their API score and
800, with a minimum target of 5 points. (Schools with
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an API above the statewide target are expected to stay
above 800.) A school's Base API score plus its growth
target becomes that school's goal for its next Growth
API. For example, a school with a Base API of 320
would be expected to improve its performance by 24
points in the next cycle, or attain an API of 344.
4) Prior legislation . AB 1919 (Brownley, 2012), nearly
identical to this bill, was vetoed by Governor Brown
in September 2012, whose veto message read:
This bill would require the State Department of
Education to send individual pupil ulevel data to
school districts that request the information.
The data would cover each and every student
attending a charter school the district
authorizes.
Authorizing districts may already collect this
data, so another law is unnecessary. The locals
can handle it.
SUPPORT
Association of California School Administrators
California Federation of Teachers
Charter Schools Association Advocates
Los Angeles Unified School District
OPPOSITION
Charter Schools Development Center