BILL ANALYSIS Ó
AB 523
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Date of Hearing: April 8, 2015
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION
Patrick O'Donnell, Chair
AB 523
Kim - As Amended March 26, 2015
SUBJECT: Open Enrollment Act: option to transfer to another
school
SUMMARY: Requires a high school district with a high school
campus within the city limits of La Palma to accept students who
reside within the city limits without regard to the attendance
boundaries. Specifically, this bill:
1)Requires, notwithstanding any other law, a high school
district that serves the City of La Palma in the County of
Orange, upon the request of a parent or guardian who resides
within the city limits to enroll the child of the parent of
guardian in a school located in the City of La Palma without
regard to the attendance boundaries of the high school
district.
2)Requires the high school district from which the pupil
transfers to send all school records of the pupil to the new
school in accordance with state law.
3)Specifies that a pupil attending a school in the City of La
Palma has the same right to continue to attend the school as
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any other pupil who otherwise satisfies the residency
requirements of the high school district.
EXISTING LAW:
1)Authorizes the governing boards of two or more school
districts to enter into an agreement, for a term not to exceed
five school years, for the interdistrict attendance of pupils.
The agreement may also provide for the admission and
enrollment of a pupil in a district other than that pupil's
district of residence (DOR) if the district of enrollment is a
party to the agreement, and requires that the district of
enrollment maintain schools and classes in kindergarten or any
of grades 1 to 12. (Education Code 46600)
2)Authorizes a school board to declare the district to be a
District of Choice (DOC) that is willing to accept a specified
number of students from outside of the DOC, as determined by
the DOC. A DOC is not required to admit pupils but is
required to select those pupils that it does elect to admit
through a random process that does not choose pupils based
upon academic or athletic talent. (Education Code 48300)
3)Establishes the Open Enrollment Program, which authorizes a
pupil enrolled in the 1000 lowest achieving schools, as
defined, to attend any higher achieving school in the state.
(Education Code 48350 - 48361)
4)Provides that a school district may deem a pupil to have
complied with the residency requirements for school attendance
in the district if at least one parent or the legal guardian
of the pupil is physically employed within the boundaries of
that district. (Education Code 48204)
EXISTING FEDERAL LAW:
1)Provides that when a Title I school fails to meet adequate
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yearly progress (AYP) goals for two or more consecutive years,
parents of children in that school have the choice to transfer
their children to schools which are (1) not identified for
Program Improvement (PI) and (2) not identified by the state
as persistently dangerous schools. (No Child Left Behind Act
of 2001 (NCLB))
2)Provides that if all public schools served by the district are
identified for PI, the district should try to establish a
cooperative agreement with other districts in order to provide
school choice. (NCLB)
FISCAL EFFECT: Unknown
COMMENTS: This bill authorizes high school students who reside
within the City of La Palma to attend a high school outside
their attendance boundary, but within the city limits. Two high
school districts split La Palma. John F. Kennedy High School is
located in the southern part of La Palma, within the Anaheim
Union High School District. Students in La Palma who reside
south of Houston Avenue attend Kennedy High School. Students
who reside north of Houston Avenue attend Buena Park High School
which is four miles away in the Fullerton Joint Union High
School District (FJUHSD). This bill would authorize students who
live north of Houston Ave to attend Kennedy High School.
The map below shows the outline of the city of La Palma, and the
darker shaded area illustrates how the city is divided by two
high school districts. The light colored square in the southeast
corner of the city limits is the John F. Kennedy High School
campus. The light colored square in the north east corner of the
larger map is the campus of Buena Park High School District.
Interdistrict Transfer Requests: Existing law allows students to
request an interdistrict transfer from their home district to
attend a school in another district. According to FJUHSD in
2014-15, they received 11 interdistrict applications to transfer
from Buena Park High School to John F. Kennedy High School, with
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seven approved and four denied. In 2013-14, they received 15
interdistrict applications, with 12 approved and three denied.
In 2012-13, they received 22 interdistrict applications, with 21
approved and one denied. FJUHSD has a district policy that
interdistrict transfers can be approved if the student wishes to
attend a specialized program that the district does not offer,
or if the parents work in another district and the student
wishes to attend school in that area. The above approvals and
denials are based on these criteria. In the last 12 years, none
of the interdistrict transfer requests have been appealed to
Orange County Office of Education (OCDE).
With this data in mind, the committee should consider whether a
problem has been demonstrated that necessitates a change in
state statute specifically for La Palma high school students to
attend Kennedy High School.
School Performance: John F. Kennedy High School's 2012 API was
860, placing the school in decile 9. Buena Park High School's
2012 API was 763, placing the school is decile 6. The committee
may wish to consider whether school performance is a factor with
regard to these interdistrict transfer requests.
Local Control: Existing authority to change school district
boundaries and to unify school districts rests at the local
level. It is the duty of local school districts and county
committees on school district reorganization to work together to
create solutions for these types of issues. This bill would
create a new precedent for the Legislature to intervene in a
local school district boundary issue.
Arguments in Support: The City of La Palma supports the bill and
states, "A recent survey of La Palma residents located within
the boundaries of the high school district without a school in
La Palma, indicated that over 98% favored legislation to allow
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for this choice and over 99%, if given the choice, would choose
the school within La Palma. The legislation would not change
any school district boundaries, just allow a choice to remain in
the community and at their nearest high school. This is not a
reflection on one district as better than another; simply that
students want to remain in the community."
Previous Legislation: SB 1445 (Harman) from 2008, which failed
passage in the Senate Education Committee, was substantially
similar to this bill.
REGISTERED SUPPORT / OPPOSITION:
Support
City of La Palma
Opposition
None on file.
Analysis Prepared by:Chelsea Kelley / ED. / (916) 319-2087
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