BILL NUMBER: AB 1014 AMENDED
BILL TEXT
AMENDED IN SENATE SEPTEMBER 1, 2015
AMENDED IN ASSEMBLY JUNE 1, 2015
AMENDED IN ASSEMBLY MAY 4, 2015
AMENDED IN ASSEMBLY MARCH 26, 2015
INTRODUCED BY Assembly Member Thurmond
(Coauthor: Assembly Member Bonta)
FEBRUARY 26, 2015
An act to add and repeal Section 48270 of the Education Code,
relating to pupils, and making an appropriation therefor.
pupils.
LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST
AB 1014, as amended, Thurmond. Pupils: truancy: Our Children's
Success-The Early Intervention Attendance Pilot Grant Program.
Existing law requires a pupil subject to compulsory full-time
education or to compulsory continuation education who is absent from
school without a valid excuse 3 full days in one school year or tardy
or absent for more than a 30-minute period during the schoolday
without a valid excuse on 3 occasions in one school year, or any
combination thereof, to be classified as a truant. Existing law
requires, upon a pupil's initial classification as a truant, a school
district to notify the pupil's parent or guardian of specified
information using the most cost-effective method possible.
This bill would make various findings and declarations regarding
truancy. The bill would establish the Our Children's Success-The
Early Intervention Attendance Pilot Grant Program under the
administration of the State Department of Education. The program
would provide grants to applicant public schools, school districts,
and county offices of education seeking to resolve the attendance
problems of pupils in kindergarten and grades 1 to 3, inclusive. The
bill would provide that the above entities maintaining kindergarten
or any of grades 1 to 3, inclusive, could apply for grants under the
program. The bill would authorize the applications for grants
submitted by the above entities to the department to reflect a plan
including specified components.
The bill would require the department to give priority in awarding
grants to those applicants who demonstrate financial need for the
grant and that have the highest truancy rates in urban areas, rural
areas, and suburban areas, respectively. The bill would require the
grants to be awarded for 3 years and to be used to address attendance
problems of pupils in kindergarten and grades 1 to 3, inclusive,
pursuant to the plans submitted by the applicant. The bill would
provide that each grant awarded be for no more than $500,000 and
would require the applicant to provide a 20% match. The bill would
require an applicant receiving a grant to submit a report, containing
specified data, to the department at the conclusion of the grant.
The bill would require the department to submit a report, on or
before January 1, 2021, to the respective appropriations committees
and education committees of the Assembly and the Senate, and would
require this report to include a recommendation on whether the grant
program should continue. The bill would provide that
the above provisions shall not be implemented unless there is an
appropriation in the annual Budget Act or another statute, as
provided. These provisions would be repealed on January 1,
2022.
The bill would appropriate an unspecified sum from an unspecified
source to the department for purposes of implementing the bill.
Vote: majority. Appropriation: yes no
. Fiscal committee: yes. State-mandated local program: no.
THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA DO ENACT AS FOLLOWS:
SECTION 1. The Legislature finds and declares all of the
following:
(a) Only 17 percent of chronically absent kindergartners and first
graders in California read proficiently by grade 3 and pupils who do
not read proficiently by grade 3 are four times more likely to drop
out of school. Children who drop out of school cost the state more
than $46 billion each year, including more than $1 billion in
juvenile crime costs alone.
(b) Ninety percent of elementary school pupils with severe
attendance problems, missing 36 or more days in the school year, are
estimated to be from low-income families.
(c) In the 2013-14 school year, 250,000 elementary school pupils
and one 1 in 10 pupils from low-income
families were chronically absent, missing 10 percent or more of the
school year.
(d) In the 2013-14 school year, African American elementary school
pupils were the highest subgroup, including homeless pupils, to be
truant and these pupils are chronically truant at four times the rate
of all other pupils.
(e) In the 2012-13 school year, one in five, or 744,085,
elementary school pupils were truant, an increase of 1.2 percent from
the 2011-12 school year.
(f) In the 2010-11 school year, California schools lost $1.4
billion in average daily attendance funding due to pupil absences and
California school districts have lost over $3.5 billion between the
2010-11 and 2013-14 school years.
SEC. 2. Section 48270 is added to the Education Code, to read:
48270. (a) Our Children's Success-The Early Intervention
Attendance Pilot Grant Program is hereby established under the
administration of the department. This grant program is established
for the purpose of helping public schools resolve the attendance
problems of pupils in kindergarten and grades 1 to 3, inclusive.
This grant program shall be implemented upon the
appropriation of sufficient funding under Section 3 of the act that
added this section.
(b) A public school, school district, or county office of
education maintaining kindergarten or any of grades 1 to 3,
inclusive, seeking to participate in the grant program established by
this section may apply to the department for a grant pursuant to
this section. An application submitted by a public school, school
district, or county office of education to the department under this
subdivision may reflect a plan that includes, but is not necessarily
limited to, all of the following components:
(1) Establishment of a training program for key school officials
and attendance staff to identify pupils with chronic attendance
problems upon their second occurrence of tardiness or absence in a
school year, and the mailing of attendance letters to the pupil's
home in a timely manner.
(2) Establishment of a phone call outreach program, including a
minimum of two calls from a school official, not limited to a
recording, to follow up on those pupils whose attendance problems
continue during that school year after the attendance letters are
mailed.
(3) Establishment of a parent advocate position or positions,
designated for ongoing followup with the pupil and the parent
throughout the school year to ensure the pupil's continued consistent
school attendance. The number of these parent advocate positions may
vary according to the school's needs, resources, and the parent
advocate's ability to manage the workload.
(4) Establishment of an outreach worker position or positions
whose primary job is assisting families with a child or children who
have ongoing chronic attendance problems. The duties of an outreach
worker include sending letters, making phone calls and home visits,
and helping to connect the family to the appropriate local, state, or
federal programs in order to resolve issues that are creating
impediments to the child's consistent attendance in school. The
number of these outreach worker positions can vary according to the
applicant's needs, resources, and the outreach worker's ability to
manage the workload.
(5) Determining that the applicant's plan is instituted, to the
best of the applicant's ability, before a pupil enters the school
attendance review board process.
(6) Establishment of a plan for teacher followup with pupils with
chronic attendance problems to make up for lost instructional time.
(7) Establishment of a plan to track both longitudinal, pupil
level pupil attendance and aggregate data on tardiness and attendance
throughout the school year to determine whether improvement has been
made.
(8) Establishment of a plan to assess trends in attendance and
chronic absence rates among pupils who are English learners, eligible
for a free or reduced-price meal, or are foster youth, as those
terms are defined in Section 42238.01, and target resources towards
those groups of pupils who are most at risk for ongoing attendance
problems.
(9) (A) Submission of deidentified, aggregate data on chronic
absence and attendance rates to the Bureau of Children's Justice
within the Department of Justice for inclusion in the report "In
School + On Track" prepared by the Office of the Attorney General.
(B) For purposes of this paragraph, "deidentified" means
information that cannot be used to identify an individual pupil.
(c) The applicant shall include an estimate for the amount of the
grant needed in the application and shall be required to provide 20
percent matching funds for any amount requested to encourage
applicants to apply for less than the maximum grant amount specified
in paragraph (2) of subdivision (f).
(d) The grant program established by this section shall not be
construed as a replacement of, or a substitution for, the school
attendance review board process as described in this article.
(e) (1) The department shall award grants under this section based
on the selection criteria in paragraph (2).
(2) The department shall give priority to those applicants who
demonstrate financial need for the grant and with the highest truancy
rates in each of the following areas:
(A) Urban areas.
(B) Rural areas.
(C) Suburban areas.
(f) (1) Grants under this section shall be awarded for three
years, and shall be used to address the attendance problems of pupils
in kindergarten and in grades 1 to 3, inclusive, pursuant to the
plans submitted by the applicant under subdivision (b).
(2) Each grant awarded pursuant to this section shall be for no
more than five hundred thousand dollars ($500,000).
(3) The department shall provide no less than 10 grants.
(4) The department shall award no more than five million dollars
($5,000,000) in total grant moneys.
(g) An applicant that receives a grant under this section shall
submit a report to the department at the conclusion of the grant.
This report shall specify how the grant funds were used and the
strategies employed to address pupil attendance problems. The report
shall also include pupil attendance data measured both before and
after the implementation of the grant.
(h) On or before January 1, 2021, the department shall submit a
report to the respective committees on appropriations and committees
on education of the Assembly and the Senate. This report shall
evaluate the strategies and the attendance data of the applicants
that received funds from the grant program established under this
section. The report shall include, but not necessarily be limited to,
a recommendation on whether the grant program should continue.
(i) This section shall not be implemented unless there is an
appropriation in the annual Budget Act or another statute for these
purposes. Notwithstanding any other law, funding for this program
shall not be from savings identified pursuant to the Safe
Neighborhoods and Schools Act, approved as Proposition 47 by the
voters at the November 4, 2014, statewide general election.
(i)
(j) This section shall remain in effect only until
January 1, 2022, and as of that date is repealed, unless a later
enacted statute, that is enacted before January 1, 2022, deletes or
extends that date.
SEC. 3. The sum of ____ dollars ($____) is
hereby appropriated to the State Department of Education for purposes
of implementing Our Children's Success-The Early Intervention
Attendance Grant Program, as established in Section 48270 of the
Education Code. It is the intent of the Legislature that the funds
appropriated under this section be drawn from sources that may
include, but are not necessarily limited to, the General Fund, the
Safe Neighborhoods and Schools Fund established by Proposition 47 on
the November 2014 statewide general election ballot, federal and
local government funds, and contributions from nonprofit
organizations and other private entities.