BILL ANALYSIS �
SENATE COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION
Carol Liu, Chair
2013-2014 Regular Session
BILL NO: SB 195
AUTHOR: Liu
INTRODUCED: February 7, 2013
FISCAL COMM: Yes HEARING DATE: April 17, 2013
URGENCY: No CONSULTANT:Kathleen Chavira
NOTE : This bill has been referred to the Committees on
Education and Rules. A do pass motion should include a
referral to the Senate Rules Committee.
SUBJECT : Postsecondary Education Statewide Goals.
SUMMARY
This bill establishes statewide goals for guiding budget and
policy decisions in higher education, requires that the
Governor's Office of Planning and Research (OPR) convene a
working group, as specified, to develop and recommend specific
metrics for measuring progress toward these goals, and
requires the OPR to report its recommendations for statewide
metrics to the appropriate policy and fiscal committees, and
the Governor, by January 31, 2014.
BACKGROUND
Current law establishes the Donahoe Higher Education Act which
outlines the laws under which postsecondary educational
institutions operate in California. (Education Code Title 3,
Division 5, Part 40)
Within the Donahoe Act, current law establishes findings and
declarations based on the periodic review of the Master Plan
for Higher Education by the Legislature. Current law declares
the intent of the Legislature to outline in statute, clear,
concise, statewide goals and outcomes for effective
implementation of the Master Plan, attuned to the public
interest of the people and State of California, and to expect
the system as a whole and the higher education segments to be
accountable for attaining those goals. Additionally,
consistent with the spirit of the original master plan and
subsequent updates, current law declares the intent of the
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Legislature that the governing boards be given ample
discretion in implementing policies and programs necessary to
attain those goals.
(Education Code � 66003)
ANALYSIS
This bill establishes statewide goals for guiding budget and
policy decisions in higher education. More specifically it:
1) Outlines the following three goals for guiding budget and
policy decisions in higher education:
a) Improved student success, to include,
but not be limited to, greater participation by
demographic groups that have participated at lower
rates, greater completion by all students and
improved outcomes for graduates.
b) Better alignment of degrees and
credentials awarded with the state's economic,
workforce and civic needs.
c) Effective and efficient use of
resources in order to increase high-quality
postsecondary educational outcomes and maintain
affordability.
2) Requires that metrics to measure progress toward these
goals be developed with the assistance of a working group
to be convened by the Governor's Office of Research and
Planning (OPR), and:
a) Outlines the make-up of the working
group to include postsecondary education segment
representatives, the Department of Finance (DOF),
1-3 members with expertise in state accountability
who are unaffiliated with any of the segments of
higher education, a representative of the
Legislative Analyst Office (LAO) and other relevant
state agency representatives, as identified by the
OPR.
b) Requires the working group to develop
at least 6 and no more than 12 measures derived from
publicly available data sources that these measures
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be able to be disaggregated and reported by gender,
race/ethnicity, income, age group, and
full-time/part-time enrollment, where appropriate
and applicable, and that metrics take into account
the distinct missions of each postsecondary segment.
c) Requires the metrics to be used for
the purposes of the annual reporting requirements
for institutions that participate in the Cal Grant
program.
d) Requires the OPR, in consultation
with DOF and the LAO, to submit the recommended
metrics developed by the working group to the
appropriate legislative policy and budget committees
and the Governor by January 31, 2014.
3) Defines the segments of postsecondary education, for
purposes of the bill, to include the California Community
Colleges, the California State University, the University
of California, the independent colleges and universities,
and proprietary postsecondary institutions.
4) Declares the Legislature's intent to:
a) Identify, define and formally adopt
appropriate metrics to be used for the purpose of
monitoring progress toward the state goals.
b) Promote progress toward the goals
through budget and policy decisions within higher
education.
c) Use the reporting system established
per the bill's provisions to help ensure the
effective and efficient use of state resources
available to higher education.
STAFF COMMENTS
1) History/Need for the bill . There has been a growing
trend toward state accountability systems for higher
education using different approaches and indicators.
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Nearly all states (including Tennessee, Texas, Illinois,
Ohio, Florida and Washington) have some form of mandated
statewide accountability program for higher education
that includes goals, performance measures, and various
degrees of performance funding.
In the past decade, the Senate has engaged in the
following activities relative to higher education
accountability:
a) In 2002, the Senate commissioned a study of
national trends in higher education accountability.
The resulting report, An Accountability Framework
for California Higher Education: Informing Public
Policy and Improving Outcome, provided the initial
framework for developing an integrated system of
accountability for higher education in California
and was the basis for several legislative efforts to
implement such a framework from 2004 to 2011.
b) On January 31, 2007, the Senate Education
Committee held an informational hearing on Higher
Education Accountability. National experts testified
on trends in higher education accountability as well
as California's specific challenges in meeting the
educational and economic needs of its citizenry.
c) On March 20, 2013, the Senate Education
Committee held an informational hearing on Higher
Education Accountability: Statewide Goals and
Metrics. National experts testified about various
state efforts to implement goals and metrics; using
progress outcome, efficiency and effectiveness
metrics to measure performance; potential data
sources, models for implementation and oversight,
and the roles of both Governors and Legislatures in
developing goals and metrics.
According to a 2010 Legislative Analyst Office
publication, The Master Plan at 50: Greater than the Sum
of its Parts, California, which set the gold standard for
higher education planning in 1960, now stands alone among
sizeable states in its lack of established goals, a
statewide plan, and an accountability system for higher
education.
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2) Most recent legislative efforts . This bill is very
similar to SB 721 (Lowenthal, 2012) which was vetoed by
the Governor in September 2012.
SB 721, like this bill, established statewide goals for
guiding budget and policy decisions in higher education,
required the Legislative Analyst's Office to convene a
working group to develop and recommend specific metrics,
and outlined an ongoing reporting process on the progress
toward statewide goals. The Governor's veto message
read, in pertinent part:
Questions about who should measure, what to measure
and how to measure what is learned in college are
way too important to be delegated to the Legislative
Analyst.
Staff notes that this bill assigns the Governor's Office
of Planning and Research (OPR) with the lead
responsibility for addressing these questions.
3) Governor's Office of Planning and Research . This bill
assigns the responsibility for leading the efforts of the
workgroup it creates to the Governor's Office of Planning
and Research. The OPR, created by statute in 1970,
provides long range planning and research for the
Governor and his Cabinet and constitutes the
comprehensive state planning agency (Government Code �
65040). This bill proposes a function for the OPR which
falls outside their current statutory scope. According
to the author, it is the intent that an appropriate
entity within the administration be identified to
collaboratively engage the Legislature and the segments
in the processes outlined in the bill.
In order to ensure the Governor has the flexibility to
identify an entity he deems appropriate staff recommends
the bill be amended to replace OPR with "an appropriate
educational administrative body, as determined by the
Governor."
4) Related budget proposal . The Governor's budget for
2013-14 proposes a multi-year funding plan for the public
postsecondary education segments and loosely links annual
funding increases with an expectation that the segments
improve their performance in the following areas:
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a) Increased graduation and completion rates;
b) Increased California Community College transfer
students enrolled at the University of California
and the California State University;
c) Decreased time-to-degree; and
d) Increased credit and basic skills course
completion.
The proposal includes no link between the funding and
enrollment expectations. In addition, according to the
LAO's 2013-2014 Analysis of the Higher Education Budget,
"by providing the segments with large unallocated
increases only vaguely connected to undefined performance
expectations, the Governor cedes substantial state
responsibilities to the segments and takes key higher
education decisions out of the Legislature's control."
Consistent with the Governor's objective to improve
performance, this bill proposes statewide goals, to be
adopted by the Legislature and endorsed by the Governor,
and proposes a process whereby the Legislature and the
administration can collaboratively identify the specific
metrics to assess progress towards priorities for higher
education.
5) The Legislature's role . As currently drafted the bill
creates a collaborative process for developing potential
metrics and requires that these recommended metrics be
reported to the Legislature by January 31, 2014. In
order to be clear, that the Legislature maintains the
authority to review and engage in a collaborative and
public discourse regarding the final metrics to be used
for assessing progress, staff recommends the bill be
amended to declare the Legislature's intent to Identify,
define and formally adopt appropriate metrics, based upon
the working group's recommendations for the purpose of
monitoring progress toward the state goals.
6) National models . The National Governors Association
(NGA), a bipartisan organization of the nation's
governors that identifies priority issues and deals
collectively with matters of public policy and governance
at the state and national levels recently adopted its
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Complete to Compete Initiative under which the NGA
proposes to:
a) Raise national awareness of the need to
increase college completion and productivity.
b) Create a set of common higher education
completion and productivity measures for governors
to use to monitor state progress.
c) Develop a series of best practices and a list
of policy actions governors can take to achieve
increased college completion.
d) Provide grants to states to design policies and
programs that increase college completion and
improve higher education productivity.
The committee may want to consider whether the bill
should be amended to require the task force to consider
and the recommended metrics to reflect the completion,
progress, and productivity measures developed by the
National Governors Association (NGA).
7) Consistent with recent Legislative Analyst Office (LAO)
recommendations .
a) In a 2010 publication, The Master Plan at 50:
Greater Than the Sum of Its Parts-Coordinating
Higher Education in California, the LAO recommended,
among other things, that the Legislature work with
the administration and others to adopt a clear
public agenda for higher education, with specific
and focused statewide goals that could serve as the
framework for an accountability system designed to
align higher education performance with the state's
needs.
b) In a 2012 LAO report, Improving Higher
Education Oversight, in response to budget
supplemental report language requested by the
Legislature as a result of the Governor's
elimination of funding for the California
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Postsecondary Education Commission (CPEC), the LAO
noted the need to protect the public interest, as
insufficient oversight could allow state priorities
to be subordinated to those of the institutions and
other interests. The LAO cited, as its foremost
recommendation, that the Legislature articulate the
state's postsecondary education needs through the
setting of specific goals or identification of key
areas or outcomes of interest to the state. The
report also recommended that the Legislature
delegate technical decisions about specific measures
and reporting protocols to a technical working group
with representatives from the administration,
legislative staff, the segments, and independent
researchers with experience in higher education
performance measurements.
The provisions of this bill are consistent with these
recommendations.
8) Related Master Plan review findings . Reviews of the
Master Plan have been conducted by the Legislature (and
occasionally by blue-ribbon commissions) about once a
decade since the 1970s. Most recently, ACR 65 (Ruskin,
Resolution Chapter 106, Statutes of 2009) created a joint
committee to review the Master Plan for Higher Education.
The Committee held several informational hearings and
convened working groups to identify potential legislative
solutions to issues raised in these hearings. As
reflected in ACR 184 (Ruskin, Chapter 163, Statutes of
2010) the review resulted in the following related
findings:
a) There is no articulated, comprehensive
statement of goals for California's system of higher
education.
b) The Master Plan articulates values but not a
set of public policy goals based upon the outcomes
required to meet the needs of our state and our
people.
c) The lack of goals makes it difficult to develop
sound systems of criteria for advancement or clear
systems of accountability.
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d) The establishment of statewide goals for
California higher education attuned to the public
interest of the people and State of California will
enable increased accountability across the entire
system and within segments.
9) Prior legislation . This bill reflects the most recent
evolution of several legislative efforts to highlight the
need for and develop an integrated system of
accountability for higher education in California. In
addition to SB 721 (see staff comment #2), these efforts
include the following:
AB 1901 (Ruskin, Chapter 201, Statutes of 2010) codified
the findings and principles that emerged from the 2010
Review of the Master Plan for Higher Education and
declared the Legislature's intent to statutorily outline
clear, concise, statewide goals and outcomes for
effective implementation of the Master Plan for Higher
Education and the expectation of the higher education
system as a whole to be accountable for attaining those
goals.
AB 2 (Portantino, 2011) and AB 218 (Portantino, 2009),
essentially identical bills, required that the state
establish an accountability framework to biennially
assess and report on the collective progress of the
state's system of postsecondary education in meeting
specified educational and economic goals. Both bills
were heard and passed by this committee and were
subsequently held under submission in the Senate
Appropriations Committee.
SB 325 (Scott), also nearly identical to AB 2 and AB 218,
was passed by the Legislature and vetoed by the Governor
in 2008. The Governor's veto message read:
While I respect the author's intent to establish a
statewide system of accountability for postsecondary
education and a framework to assess the collective
contribution of California's institutions of higher
education toward meeting statewide economic and
educational goals, this bill falls short in
providing any framework for incentives or
consequences that would modify behavior to meet any
policy objectives. I believe our public education
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systems should be held accountable for achieving
results, including our higher education segments,
and would consider a measure in the future that
provides adequate mechanisms that will effectuate
tangible gains in student outcomes and operational
efficiencies.
SB 1331 (Alpert) passed by the Legislature and vetoed by
the Governor in 2004, would have established a California
Postsecondary Education Accountability (CPSEA) structure
to provide an annual assessment of how the state is
meeting identified statewide public policy goals in
higher education. The Governor's veto message read in
pertinent part:
While I favor accountability for all levels of
education, this bill mainly establishes only a
reporting structure for four broad policy goals
rather than providing for outcomes, such as
performance based measures, historically associated
with accountability systems.
SUPPORT
Campaign for College Opportunity
OPPOSITION
Faculty Association of the California Community Colleges