BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SENATE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
Senator Ricardo Lara, Chair
2015 - 2016 Regular Session
AB 713 (Weber) - Elementary education: kindergarten
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|Version: June 1, 2015 |Policy Vote: ED. 7 - 2 |
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|Urgency: No |Mandate: Yes |
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|Hearing Date: August 17, 2015 |Consultant: Jillian Kissee |
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This bill meets the criteria for referral to the Suspense File.
Bill
Summary: This bill requires that beginning with the 2017-18
school year, children complete one year of kindergarten before
being admitted to the first grade.
Fiscal
Impact:
This bill will likely result in increased average daily
attendance (ADA) which will drive ongoing costs in the
Proposition 98 Guarantee in the low to mid hundreds of
millions beginning in the 2016-17 school year. Within the
Guarantee, the increase in ADA would drive cost increases in
costs in the state's Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) and
special education program which will absorb much of the
increase in the Proposition 98 Guarantee. See staff comments.
Unknown, potential additional reimbursable state mandate
costs. See staff comments. (Proposition 98)
AB 713 (Weber) Page 1 of
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Background: Existing law requires every person between the ages of six and
18 years to attend school, for at least the minimum school day
as required by statute and school districts. (Education Code §
48200)
Existing law requires a school to admit a student to
kindergarten if the student will be five years old by September
1 of the school year. Children are not, however, required to
attend kindergarten. (EC § 48000) A student must be admitted to
the first grade if the student will be six years old by
September 1 of the school year. (EC § 48010)
Existing law authorizes school districts to admit a student to
kindergarten on a case-by-case basis who will be five years old
during the school year, subject to the following conditions: 1)
the governing board of the school district determines that the
admittance is in the best interests of the student; and, 2) the
parent is given information regarding the advantages and
disadvantages and any other explanatory information about the
effect of this early admittance. (EC § 48000)
The Budget Act of 2013 established a new LCFF to allocate
funding to local educational agencies. The formula consolidated
most of the state's separate funding streams for prescribed
purposes and removed most of the related funding restrictions.
The formula is designed to provide the bulk of resources in
unrestricted funding to support the basic educational program
for all students, plus supplemental funding, based on the
enrollment and concentration of educationally disadvantaged
students (low-income students, English learners (ELs), and
foster youth), provided to increase or improve services to these
high-needs students.
The LCFF allocates base grants to all school districts and
charter schools. They are calculated on a per-pupil basis
(measured by student ADA) according to grade span. Supplemental
grants provide an additional 20 percent in base grant funding to
school districts and charter schools for each low-income
student, EL, and foster youth (unduplicated pupil count).
Finally, concentration grants provide an additional 50 percent
above base grant funding to school districts and charter schools
for each low-income student, EL, and foster youth that exceed 55
percent of total enrollment.
AB 713 (Weber) Page 2 of
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Proposed Law:
This bill requires that beginning with the 2017-18 school
year, children must have completed one year of kindergarten
before being admitted to the first grade. It also adds
completion of one year of kindergarten as one of the conditions
of admission to first grade, but does not specify a starting
date for this requirement. This bill also requires each entity,
as specified, offering or conducting private school kindergarten
instruction to file a statement including specified information
about their school and program to the California Department of
Education (CDE). Finally, this bill requires the Superintendent
of Public Instruction to include schools that provide
kindergarten in the list it publishes of private elementary and
high schools.
Related
Legislation: AB 1444 (Buchanan, 2014) and AB 1772 (Buchanan,
2012) similar to this bill, would have required a student to
have completed one year of kindergarten before being admitted to
the first grade. AB 1444 was vetoed by Governor Brown. AB 1772
was held in the Assembly Appropriations Committee.
AB 2203 (V. Manuel Perez, 2012) and AB 1236 (Mullin, 2008) would
have expanded compulsory education laws to include five-year-old
children. Both bills were held in the Assembly Appropriations
Committee.
Staff
Comments: This bill makes one year of kindergarten attendance a
prerequisite to attending first grade. Kindergarten is not
currently mandatory in California, though the vast majority of
age-eligible children do attend kindergarten.
Since ADA, beginning in kindergarten, is one of the factors used
to determine the size of the Proposition 98 Guarantee, costs
will depend on the number of additional students who will enroll
in kindergarten in a public school. This number is difficult to
determine as it is unknown how many children will attend
kindergarten in private school. However, assuming this bill
AB 713 (Weber) Page 3 of
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results in increased ADA of about 33,000 based on the number of
five-year-olds in the state and the number of children enrolled
in public kindergarten, before the implementation of
transitional kindergarten, the Guarantee could increase by about
$400 million in the 2016-17 fiscal year. This bill seems to
contemplate that parents would enroll their children into
kindergarten in the 2016-17 school year to fulfill the
requirement to have completed one year by the 2017-18 school
year. Therefore, increases in ADA could be realized in the
2016-17 fiscal year.
This estimate does not take into account children already
attending private school kindergarten, or the parents that would
choose to send their children to private school if this bill is
enacted. Therefore, assuming a smaller increase of ADA of
15,000 is realized in the 2016-17 school year, the Guarantee
could increase by about $220 million.
Within the Guarantee, funding for programs driven by ADA would
increase, including the LCFF and special education. The state
provides funding for each student, as well as supplemental
funding depending on whether the student is low-income, EL, or a
foster youth. The level of funding needed for the LCFF would
vary annually, depending on those factors. In addition, changes
in ADA drive corresponding changes in required funding for the
state's special education program as its appropriation is
distributed based on ADA. Increased funding for special
education results in an increase in its maintenance of effort
requirement, which essentially is a floor for annual program
spending. Staff estimates increases in the LCFF and special
education to be roughly between $144 million and $320 million
depending upon whether the lower or higher estimate of increased
ADA is assumed.
This bill could result in a reimbursable state mandate due to
the requirement that local educational agencies provide
kindergarten. Costs would be offset by apportionments made on a
per-pupil basis through the LCFF. If school districts claim
reimbursement for activities that exceed the per-pupil funding
amount, such as additional facilities to provide kindergarten
instruction to additional students, the Commission on State
Mandates may consider this a reimbursable activity which would
increase the costs associated with this bill.
AB 713 (Weber) Page 4 of
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Staff notes that current law requires the Superintendent of
Public Instruction to provide the Legislature with an evaluation
of the implementation of kindergarten in the state, including
part-day and full-day kindergarten programs. The Budget Act of
2015 appropriates $550,000 General Fund for this purpose.
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