BILL ANALYSIS                                                                                                                                                                                                    Ó




                   Senate Appropriations Committee Fiscal Summary
                            Senator Kevin de León, Chair


          AB 2160 (Ting) - Cal Grant Awards: GPA Verification
          
          Amended: June 18, 2014          Policy Vote: Education 6-0
          Urgency: No                     Mandate: Yes
          Hearing Date: August 4, 2014                                 
          Consultant: Jacqueline Wong-Hernandez                       
          
          This bill meets the criteria for referral to the Suspense File. 
          
          Bill Summary: AB 2160 requires the California Student Aid  
          Commission (CSAC) to require electronic submission of the grade  
          point average (GPA) of all 12th grade students at public schools  
          and charter schools and, with specified exceptions, deems all  
          12th grade students in a California public school to be Cal  
          Grant applicants for this purpose. This bill requires that  
          parents be notified of such, and that they be provided an  
          opportunity to opt out of such designation by a school district  
          or charter school. 

          Fiscal Impact: 
              Mandate: Potentially significant reimbursable mandate on  
              school districts to electronically submit the GPAs of every  
              12th grade student, with specified exceptions, and to  
              administer an opt-out system for families.
              CSAC administration: Potentially significant workload to  
              receive and process additional GPAs, and to provide  
              technical assistance to schools and school districts. This  
              workload would be off-set, to some degree, by a reduction in  
              the number of hard copy GPAs that CSAC processes.  
              Cal Grant awards: Potentially significant Cal Grant costs  
              (General Fund), to the extent that this bill results in more  
              Cal Grant awards.

          Background: Existing law requires GPAs for Cal Grant A and B  
          applicants to be submitted to CSAC; requires GPAs to include a  
          certification by a school official that the GPA is accurately  
          reported; authorizes CSAC to establish grace periods for the  
          receipt of GPAs and corrections; and, establishes Legislative  
          intent that high schools and institutions of higher education  
          certify GPAs of students in time to meet Cal Grant application  
          deadlines.  (Education Code § 69432) 









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          A school district is prohibited from permitting access to pupil  
          records without written parental consent with some exceptions,  
          as specified. School districts are authorized to release  
          information from pupil records to agencies or organizations in  
          connection with the application of a pupil for, or receipt of,  
          financial aid. (EC § 49076)

          The federal Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA)  
          regulations authorize an educational agency or institution to  
          disclose personally identifiable information from an education  
          record of a student without consent if the disclosure meets one  
          of several specified conditions. These include an instance in  
          which the disclosure is in connection with financial aid for  
          which the student has applied or which the student has received,  
          if the information is necessary to: a) determine eligibility for  
          the aid; b) determine the amount of the aid; c) determine the  
          conditions for the aid; or, d) enforce the terms and conditions  
          of the aid.  (34 CFR 99.31(a)(4))

          Proposed Law: This bill deems each student enrolled in 12th  
          grade in a California public school to be a Cal Grant applicant,  
          and requires every school district, or charter school, by  
          October 15 annually, to: 

                 a)        Notify the parent/guardian of each 12th grade  
                 student that the student will be deemed a Cal Grant  
                 applicant.

                 b)        Provide an opportunity for the student to opt  
                 out of being automatically deemed a Cal Grant applicant. 

          This bill requires that the CSAC require all public high  
          schools, including charter schools, to provide an electronic  
          submission of a GPA for each 12th grade student, each academic  
          year, with specified exceptions.

          Staff Comments: In order to apply for a Cal Grant award, a  
          student must complete the Free Application for Federal Student  
          Aid (FAFSA) or a Dream Act application, and the CSAC must  
          receive the student's verified GPA. Currently, there is no  
          standard practice for submitting GPA verification to the CSAC.  
          Some schools submit hard copy verification forms, others submit  
          GPAs electronically, and still others rely on their students to  
          submit the verification forms themselves (once signed by a  








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          school official).
          
          This bill requires the CSAC to require public schools to submit  
          the GPAs of all of their 12th grade students (with specified  
          exceptions) to the CSAC each year. While schools currently  
          verify student GPAs upon student request, and some have systems  
          for communicating all GPAs to the CSAC, the only statutory  
          "requirement" on schools is legislative intent language  
          specifying that schools "certify the grade point averages of  
          their students in time to meet the application deadlines" of the  
          Cal Grant. This bill enacts a new universal requirement to  
          electronically transfer every 12th grade student's GPA, which  
          will likely constitute a significant reimbursable mandate on  
          public schools.  Transferring GPAs to the CSAC electronically  
          could ultimately save staff time and school resources compared  
          to a hard copy process that may exist at a school. However,  
          whatever process the school currently uses is at local option  
          and, thus, not reimbursable. This requirement will make the act  
          of transferring GPAs a reimbursable mandate, even for schools  
          that were already submitting GPAs to the CSAC electronically.
          
          In order to comply with FERPA protections, this bill deems each  
          student enrolled in 12th grade in a California public school to  
          be a Cal Grant applicant. Under FERPA, a school can transfer  
          certain student information to other entities as part of an  
          application for financial aid; since this bill would make every  
          12th grade student an applicant, GPAs could be transferred as a  
          batch. Separate from FERPA compliance, this bill does require an  
          opt-out process.

          This bill requires every school district, or charter school, by  
          October 15 annually, to: a) notify the parent/guardian of each  
          12th grade student that the student will be deemed a Cal Grant  
          applicant; and, b) provide an opportunity for the student to opt  
          out of being automatically deemed a Cal Grant applicant. This  
          bill's requirement for schools to administer an opt-out process  
          for students will also likely be deemed by the Commission on  
          State Mandates to be reimbursable. 

          Staff notes that the opt-out provision may need clarification.  
          The bill language specifies that parents and guardians receive  
          notifications that "the pupil will be deemed a Cal Grant  
          applicant unless the pupil opts out". Typically, a parent or  
          guardian makes that decision when a pupil is under age 18; once  








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          a pupil is 18, he or she can make those decisions. This bill  
          will impact students that are likely to be 17 and 18-year-olds,  
          and who may be 17 when a parent receives the opt-out  
          notification but turn 18 before the GPA would actually be sent  
          to the CSAC. The author may wish to clarify intent regarding how  
          schools should handle the required opt-out process.
          
          The most significant cost of this bill will likely be in  
          increased Cal Grant application completions, and the resulting  
          increase in Cal Grant awards. This bill is likely to increase  
          application completion rates, but it is not known what that  
          increase will yield in terms of actual awards. If, for example,  
          the measure were to result in 4,000 more awards in the first  
          year dispersed across UC and CSU so as to average to $7,000  
          each, the cost of the additional awards would be about $28  
          million in the first year, growing annually thereafter as  
          additional cohorts were added.