BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SENATE COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION
Senator Carol Liu, Chair
2015 - 2016 Regular
Bill No: AB 2069
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|Author: |Medina |
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|Version: |May 27, 2016 Hearing |
| |Date: June 15, 2016 |
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|Urgency: |No |Fiscal: |Yes |
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|Consultant:|Kathleen Chavira |
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Subject: Seymour-Campbell Student Success Act of 2012
SUMMARY
This bill expands the metrics to be reported in order to
evaluate the effectiveness of matriculation services at the
California Community Colleges (CCC) to include the annual ratio
of paid part-time faculty hours per part-time faculty full-time
equivalent.
BACKGROUND
Existing law establishes the Seymour Campbell Student Success
Act of 2012 to, among other things, increase California
community college student access and success by providing
effective core matriculation services, including orientation,
assessment and placement, counseling, and other education
planning services, and academic interventions. Colleges and
districts receiving funding under the Act agree to abide by its
provisions. (Education Code § 78210-78219)
Existing law requires districts that participate in the Act to
establish and maintain institutional research to evaluate the
effectiveness of the Student Success and Support Program under
the Act. Existing law establishes a number of metrics for this
research including, prior educational experience, educational
goals and courses of study, criteria for exemption from
matriculation services, need for financial assistance, academic
performance, and data disaggregated by ethnicity, gender,
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disability, age and socioeconomic status, to the extent that
information is available.
Existing law establishes the Community College Part-time Faculty
Office Hours Program, contingent upon annual Budget Act funding,
for the purpose of providing community college students with
access to academic advice and assistance and to encourage
districts to provide opportunities to compensate those who old
office hours related to their teaching load. The governing board
of each district that establishes such a program is required to
negotiate with the exclusive bargaining representative (or, if
none exists, with the faculty) to establish the program.
Participating districts are required to inform the Chancellor's
office of the total costs of part-time faculty office hours
compensation paid and the Chancellors office is required to
apportion up to 50% of these costs, to be distributed
proportionally based upon each districts' total cost and the
total amount provided in the annual Budget Act. (EC §
87880-87885)
ANALYSIS
This bill:
1) Expands the metrics to be reported in order to evaluate the
effectiveness of matriculation services at the California
Community Colleges (CCC) to include the annual ratio of
paid part-time faculty office hours per part-time faculty
full-time equivalent.
2) Declares the Legislature's intent that these requirements
should not affect the allocation of Student Success and
Support Program funding.
3) Identifies potentially reimbursable state mandated costs.
STAFF COMMENTS
1) Need for the bill. The author states, "Given the
importance of office hours on student performance, and the
significant proportion of classes taught by part-time
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faculty, this metric should be included in the Student
Success Scorecard. The measure will further support the
goals of the Seymour-Campbell Student Success Act by
including the collection of metrics essential for student
success."
2) Part-time Faculty Office Hours. In 1997, the Legislature
created the Community College Part-Time Faculty Office
Hours Program to improve student access to instructors by
establishing a fund to reimburse districts 50% of their
costs if they negotiated some level of office hour
compensation for their part-time faculty members. Funding
for this program is currently disbursed on a reimbursement
basis to participating community college districts pursuant
to Section 87885.
The program had been funded at a level of about $ 2 million
per year until 2001-02, when it reached its peak of funding
at $7.1 million. During the recession (2009- 2015) this
funding was reduced to about $3.5 million per year. Both
the Senate and the Assembly have proposed restoral of
funding for the program in the annual Budget Act for the
last two years. Both houses have again included an
increase to the part-time faculty office hour's program in
their 2016-17 budget bills and it appears likely that total
funding for the program will be restored to the 2008-09
pre-recession level of $7.1 million.
3) Data Collection Challenges. According to the CCC, paid
part-time faculty office hours are not a state requirement
and vary by district according to their individual local
bargaining contracts. Consequently statewide data are
inconsistent. The Chancellor's Office is only able to
track information from districts which specifically
participate in the state's Part-Time Faculty Office Hours
Program. The Chancellor's Office reports that, for the
current fiscal year, they have received claims from 30 of
the 72 districts, and they expect to receive a few more
claims before the June deadline for reporting this
information.
The Chancellor's office also noted that districts that do
not participate in the program are not precluded from
paying for office hours with other funds. However, the
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current methodology for data collection does not provide a
level of detail that would allow the Chancellors office to
determine which districts pay for office hours using other
sources of funding.
Since the use of paid part-time faculty hours varies by
district, making this information consistent and accurate
enough to be useful would involve a costly process.
According to the Chancellor's, colleges which offer paid
office hours would need to determine how to accurately
track and collect this data from all their part-time
faculty in a standardized way, and then have it reported to
their local Management Information System (MIS.) Recent
feedback from local Chief Technology Officers indicates an
estimated average cost of $8000-$12,000 at each of the 72
districts to re-vamp their MIS to include this data
collection element.
4) Linking reporting requirements/objective. Notwithstanding
the importance of student access to faculty, the
matriculation program reporting requirements focus upon an
evaluation of the effective use of Student Success and
Support Program funds to provide matriculation services by
requiring reporting on related student outcomes. This bill
would incorporate reporting on an element related to
faculty and that is a subject of collective bargaining. In
addition, as noted in staff comment #3, collection and
reporting of this information through a data reporting
system is complex and costly, and arguably would require
funding that might be better used to actually provide for
part-time faculty office hours.
According to the author, the intent of this bill is to create
transparency for students and faculty as to a district's policy
around part-time faculty office hours. Staff recommends the
bill be amended to delete this specific reporting requirement
from this section of the Education Code. Staff further
recommends the bill be amended to require that each community
college district prominently post on its Web site whether or not
part-time instructors at the campus offer office hours.
SUPPORT
California Federation of Teachers
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Faculty Association of California Community Colleges
Student Senate for California Community Colleges
OPPOSITION
None received.
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