BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SENATE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
Senator Ricardo Lara, Chair
2015 - 2016 Regular Session
AB 491 (Gonzalez) - English learners: identification: notice
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|Version: June 23, 2016 |Policy Vote: ED. 9 - 0 |
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|Urgency: No |Mandate: Yes |
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|Hearing Date: August 1, 2016 |Consultant: Jillian Kissee |
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This bill meets the criteria for referral to the Suspense File.
Bill
Summary: This bill expands parental notification requirements
relative to long-term English learners; requires the California
Department of Education (CDE) to develop a sample notification
letter disclosing the use of the results of the home language
survey which determines the primary language of a student upon
enrollment; and requires districts to provide the letter to
parents at the time the home language survey is provided.
Fiscal
Impact:
The CDE estimates one-time costs of $32,000 General Fund to
develop a sample notification letter.
State reimbursable mandate costs potentially in the hundreds
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of thousands for school districts to provide the notification
letter to parents or guardians of a student when the home
language survey is provided, and to expand the information to
be included in the parent notice of assessment of his or her
child's English language proficiency. See staff comments.
(Proposition 98)
Potential significant cost pressure to create an assessment to
measure a child's proficiency in his or her primary language.
To the extent the intent of this bill is to require such an
assessment, administrative costs to the CDE would be about
$308,000 General Fund for two additional positions to contract
out for the development of the new assessment would cost
around $21.5 million over multiple years (Proposition 98
funds). Actual costs would likely change from this estimate
once a contractor is chosen and assessment development
activities get underway. Additional costs would be incurred
by local educational agencies to administer the assessment.
See staff comments.
Background: Existing law requires the determination of a student's primary
language upon enrollment and assessment of the language skills
of all students whose primary language is other than English.
(Education Code § 52164.1)
Federal law requires a school district that receives federal
funds for providing a language instruction education program for
limited English proficient students to provide notice to a
parent within 30 days of the start of the school year of
specified information if their child has been identified for
participation in the program. In addition, state law requires
that, in conformance with these provisions, the notice include
specified information. (Title 20, § 7012, USC)
Both federal and state law require that each school district
with English language learners annually assess these students'
English language development until they are redesignated as
English proficient. (EC § 313)
This bill is intended to respond to concerns that the current
home language survey process "misidentifies" students as English
learners and makes it difficult to correct any
"misidentifications". According to the CDE, pending regulations
AB 491 (Gonzalez) Page 2 of
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create a corrective action process that, if adopted, would allow
for a change in a child's English learner identification. Also,
according to the author, no information is currently provided in
the parental notification of a student's English proficiency
regarding students who are long-term English learners or at risk
of becoming one.
Proposed Law:
This bill requires that in addition to the information already
required to be included in the notice of assessment of a child's
English proficiency, a public school is also required to
include:
Whether the child is, or is at-risk of becoming, a long-term
English learner.
The manner in which the program for English language
development instruction will meet the educational strengths
and needs of those at risk of becoming, or those who are,
long-term English learners and the manner in which the program
will help them develop English proficiency and meet
age-appropriate academic standards.
This bill also requires the CDE to make a sample notification
letter available to public schools that is required to be
provided with the home language survey used to determine the
primary language of the student at the time of enrollment. The
notification letter must explain the purpose of the home
language survey and the procedures for identification and
reclassification of English learners.
The notification must include, but is not limited to, the
following statements:
"If a language other than English is noted on your child's
home language survey, the law requires us to test your child's
English and primary language proficiency."
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"If there is a mistake in completing the home language survey,
you may dispute the school district's determination of your
child's primary language and ask the school district to
redetermine your child's primary language. (Education Code
Section 52164.1.)"
"Once your child's English and primary language proficiency is
tested and your child is identified as an English learner,
changing the home language survey will not change your child's
identification as an English learner."
Staff
Comments: This bill requires the CDE to include certain
statements on the sample notification letter to parents. Two
statements assert that existing law requires the local
educational agencies to test a child's primary language
proficiency if a language other than English is noted on the
home language survey. However, existing law only applies to
testing a child's proficiency in English, not in their primary
language. It is unclear whether it is the intent of this bill
is to require additional testing in the child's primary
language. If this is the case, significant costs would be
required to contract out for the development of such assessment
and administer the assessment at the state and local level.
This bill makes modifications to the required contents of the
parent notice of assessment of his or her child's English
language proficiency. It requires greater specificity by
requiring information on how long-term English learners or those
at risk of becoming long-term English learners, in particular,
will benefit from the program for English language development
instruction. This requirement may be deemed consistent within
the existing structure of federal law. However, this bill also
requires that the notification include information on whether
the child is a long-term English learner or at risk of becoming
one. This requirement may be deemed a state reimbursable
mandate as it does not appear to be a federal requirement,
resulting in likely minor state reimbursable costs. This notice
would go out to all parents of roughly 1.4 million designated
English learner students in the state.
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This bill also requires each school district to provide the
notification letter developed by the CDE to the parents or
guardians of a student at the time the home language survey is
provided. This notice would go out to all parents of roughly 6
million public school students in the state. Based on uniform
costs developed by the Commission on State Mandates for the
existing annual parent notification mandate, potential
reimbursable costs related to the parent notifications in this
bill could reach around $600,000 statewide.
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