BILL ANALYSIS Ó
Senate Appropriations Committee Fiscal Summary
Senator Kevin de León, Chair
SB 379 (Hancock) - School Attendance: Early and Middle College
High Schools
Amended: April 17, 2013 Policy Vote: Education 9-0
Urgency: No Mandate: No
Hearing Date: May 6, 2013 Consultant: Jacqueline
Wong-Hernandez
This bill does not meet the criteria for referral to the
Suspense File.
Bill Summary: SB 379 exempts a charter-operated early college or
middle college high school from the 240 minute requirement for a
minimum school day and establishes a day of attendance as 180
minutes for pupils enrolled in these programs, as specified.
Fiscal Impact: This bill will not result in new or additional
costs to the state.
Background: Early college high schools are small, autonomous
schools that blend high school and college into a coherent
educational program. Middle college high school programs are
also small, autonomous schools that blend high school and
college into a coherent educational program but have a career
preparation/work experience component. Both programs focus on
students from communities underrepresented in postsecondary
education, first generation college students, and English
learners.
Existing law specifies that the minimum school day in any high
school is 240 minutes. However, evening high schools, early
college high schools, middle college high schools, regional
occupational centers, opportunity schools and opportunity
classes, continuation high schools, and occupationally organized
vocational training programs are exempt from this 240 minute
minimum day requirement. (Education Code § 46141, § 46144, and §
52325)
Existing law also provides that a day of attendance in grades 11
and 12 is 180 minutes if the pupil is also enrolled part time in
classes of the CSU or the UC. A day of attendance for a pupil
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who is also a special part-time student enrolled in a community
college and who will receive academic credit upon satisfactory
completion of enrolled courses is 180 minutes. For purposes of
computing average daily attendance (ADA) for these pupils,
current law specifies that the 180 minute minimum is computed as
three-quarters of a full 240 minute day. (Education Code §
47146)
Education Code § 46146.5 was added by SB 1316 (Hancock), last
year, which reduces the minimum instructional minutes for
students in grades 11 and 12 attending early or middle college
high schools from 240 to 180 minutes and allows these schools to
receive full ADA for those students.
Proposed Law:
Related Legislation: SB 1316 (Hancock) Ch. 67/2012 allowed early
college and middle college high school students who are also
enrolled in college to meet the minimum day requirement of 180
minutes. However, SB 1316 did not specifically apply to charter
operated programs.
Staff Comments: This bill clarifies minimum instructional minute
requirements for charter schools offering an early college or
middle college program, and will not result in additional state
costs compared to existing law.
Prior to the enactment of SB 1316 (Hancock) 2012, early and
middle college high school programs operated by school districts
(each in conjunction with a college) could either meet the
minimum 240 instructional minute requirement for high school
students and receive 100% of a full ADA or reduce instructional
minutes to a minimum of 180 minutes and receive 75% of a full
ADA. The option to reduce the minimum number of instructional
minutes, in exchange for accepting reduced ADA funding, was not
(prior to SB 1316) and is not currently available to charter
schools operating the same programs.
Therefore, they are still required to provide 64,800 minutes of
instruction per year, which is the equivalent of 288 minutes per
day of instructional time.
The enactment of SB 1316 (EC § 46146.5) allows school district
operated early college and middle college high school students
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who are also enrolled in college to meet the minimum day
requirement of 180 minutes and still receive 100% of a full ADA.
Like the previous statutes, this statute did not specifically
apply to charter operated programs, and they have been advised
that they are excluded. As a result, there are two sets of
requirements for programs operated by comprehensive high schools
and charter schools.
Charter schools operate 24 such programs statewide, and enroll
approximately 2,300 students. This bill would apply the 180
instructional minutes requirement to charter operated early and
middle college programs, and allow them to receive 100% of a
full ADA. Absent this bill, charter school operated programs
would continue to offer their 288 instructional minute minimum
days, and continue to receive the same funding level. They do
not have the option of accepting reduced ADA in exchange for
reducing their instructional minutes; so, this bill does not
incur new costs for the same programs. This bill would allow
charter schools the flexibility school districts are given over
their early and middle college high school programs.