BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SENATE COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION
Senator Carol Liu, Chair
2015 - 2016 Regular
Bill No: AB 2137
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|Author: |Santiago |
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|Version: |May 27, 2016 Hearing |
| |Date: June 29, 2016 |
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|Urgency: |No |Fiscal: |Yes |
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|Consultant:|Kathleen Chavira |
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Subject: Postsecondary education: University of California:
student transfers
SUMMARY
This bill requests the University of California (UC) Regents to
annually report from 2017-2022, as specified, on California
Community Colleges (CCC) transfer students admitted to the UC.
BACKGROUND
Existing law declares the Legislature's intent that the
California State University (CSU) and the University of
California (UC), for purposes of enrollment planning and
admission priority practice at the undergraduate level,
prioritize California Community College transfer students in an
approved transfer agreement program, among others. (Education
Code § 66202)
Existing law requires the Board of Governors of the CCC, the UC
Regents, and the Trustees of the CSU, in consultation with their
respective Academic Senates, to jointly develop, maintain and
disseminate a common core curriculum in general education course
for the purposes of transfer, and establishes a variety of
related requirements. The UC is specifically requested to
establish articulation of major preparation courses, transfer
agreements, and transfer pathways. (EC § 66720-66722.5)
Existing law requires each department, school, and major of the
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UC and CSU to establish discipline specific articulation and
transfer program agreements for majors with lower division
prerequisites and establishes a number of related reporting and
other requirements. (EC § 66740, et seq.)
Existing law establishes the Student Transfer Achievement Reform
Act under which CCC districts are required to develop and grant
a transfer associate degree that deems the student eligible for
transfer into the CSU, when the student meets specified course
requirements. In addition, the CSU is required to guarantee
admission with junior status to any community college student
who meets specified requirements, but provides that the student
is not guaranteed admission for specific majors or campuses.
However, the CSU is required to grant a student priority
admission to his or her local CSU campus and to a program or
major that is similar to his or her community college major or
area of emphasis, as determined by the CSU campus to which the
student is admitted. Students that utilize the associate
transfer degree process are required to receive priority over
all other community college transfer students, except for
community college
students who have entered into a transfer agreement between a
community college and the CSU prior to the fall term of the
2012-13 academic year. (EC § 66745-66749.5)
ANALYSIS
This bill:
1) Requires the regents of the University of California (UC)
to annually report on California Community College (CCC)
transfer students admitted to the UC, as specified,
beginning no later than March 2017 and until March 2022.
Specifically it:
a) Requires reporting on students who
indicate on their admission application that they
received an Associate Degree for Transfer (ADT) and
who were admitted, broken down by the UC campus. It
requires that the UC report:
i) The number of these
students along with their average community
college grade point average.
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ii) The admissions and yield rate for these
students.
iii) The number of these students who
enrolled along with their average community
college grade point average.
iv) The number of these students who
graduated from the UC within 2 or 3 years for the
cohort graduating in the year of each report.
b) Requires reporting on students who used
the transfer admission guarantee and were granted
admission to the UC, broken down by UC campus. It
requires that the UC report:
i) The number of these
students along with their average community
college grade point average.
ii) The admissions and yield rate for these
students.
iii) The number of these students who
enrolled along with their average community
college grade point average.
iv) The number of these students who
graduated from the UC within 2 or 3 years for the
cohort graduating in the year of each report.
c) No later than March 1, 2019, requests
that these annual reports include information students
who used a UC Transfer Pathway and were granted
admission to the UC, broken down by UC campus. It:
i) The number of these
students along with their average community
college grade point average.
ii) The admissions and yield rate for these
students.
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iii) The number of these students who
enrolled along with their average community
college grade point average.
iv) The number of these students who
graduated from the University of California (UC)
within 2 or 3 years for the cohort graduating in
the year of each report.
2) Requests, to the extent the information is available, that
the UC report each category outlined broken down by student
ethnicity.
3) Repeals these provisions on January 1, 2024.
STAFF COMMENTS
1) Need for the bill. According to the author, while good
progress on transfer has been made, the Legislature must
continue to monitor the UC to ensure a straightforward
transfer process is available to all students. This bill
will result in more information to help the Legislature
track the UC's efforts to strengthen and simplify transfer.
2) Clarification. This bill would require reporting on three
distinct pathways for admission to the UC as a transfer
student. These include the Associate Degree for Transfer,
the Transfer Admissions Guarantee, and the UC Transfer
Pathways. The bill requires that the UC separately report,
for each of these, the number of students admitted and
enrolled, and their average GPAs, as well as the admission
and yield rates and the 2 or 3 year graduation rates for
each of these distinct transfer alternatives.
3) Related activity. In December 2013, the President of the
UC convened the Transfer Action Team (TAT) to review and
recommend strategies to strengthen and streamline transfer
between the California Community Colleges (CCC's) and the
UC. In May 2014, the TAT issued its report, "Preparing
California For Its Future: Enhancing Community College
Student Transfer to UC," which included several
recommendations, including, the need to streamline and
strengthen the UC transfer preparation process, the need
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for UC to commit to working with CCC and California State
University (CSU) to jointly engage in statewide strategic
planning to improve the transfer pathway, present a united
voice for higher education in Sacramento and with the
California public, and increase the capacity of the
segments to accommodate students.
4) Transfer options.
a) Associate Degree for Transfer (ADT). SB 1440
(Padilla, Chapter 428, Statues of 2010) creates the
Student Transfer Achievement Reform (STAR) Act, which
requires community colleges to create two-year 60 unit
Associate Degree for Transfers (ADTs) that are fully
transferable to CSU. Students who earn such a degree
are automatically eligible to transfer to the CSU
system as an upper-division student in a bachelor's
degree program. Though these students are not
guaranteed admission to a particular California State
University (CSU) campus or into a particular degree
program, the legislation gives them priority admission
to a CSU program that is "similar" to the student's
California Community College (CCC) major or area of
emphasis, as determined by the CSU campus to which the
student is admitted. Once admitted, these students
need only complete two additional years (an additional
60 units) of coursework to earn a bachelor's degree.
AB 2302 (Fong, Chapter 427, Statues of 2010)
authorized any community college student who met all
the requirements for transfer established by SB 1440
to request that the University of California (UC)
guarantee admission with junior status and to request
the granting of priority admission to a program or
major similar to his or her community college major or
area of emphasis.
SB 440 (Padilla, Chapter 720, Statutes of 2013)
expanded the provisions of the Student Transfer
Achievement Reform Act to require that CCCs create
Associate Degree for Transfer (ADTs) in every major,
and in areas of emphasis, and to require that the CSU
accept these degrees, and develop an admissions
redirection process for students who complete these
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degrees but are denied admission to the CSU campus to
which they have applied. It also required the CCC and
the CSU to establish a student-centered communication
and marketing strategy to increase the visibility of
the ADT pathway, as specified.
b) UC Transfer Pathways. In July 2015, the UC
announced its Transfer Pathways which outlined a
single set of community college courses that
prospective transfer students can take to prepare for
10 different majors at any of UC's nine undergraduate
campuses. UC recently announced that an additional 11
Transfer Pathways were finalized providing academic
roadmaps for the 21 most popular majors for transfer
students. The Transfer Pathways cover two-thirds of
all transfer admissions applications UC receives.
According to the UC, the Transfer Pathways are very
similar to the Associate Degree for Transfer. Both
provide lists of courses that prepare students for a
major at UC or CSU. In general, the courses expected
in the ADTs and the UC pathways for the same major are
similar. In the sciences, however, the UC may require
more preparation than the ADTs.
c) Transfer Admission Guarantee (TAG). Six UC
campuses (Davis, Irvine, Merced, Riverside, Santa
Barbara, and Santa Cruz) offer the transfer admission
guarantee program for CCC students who meet specific
requirements. Students participating in TAG will
receive early review of their academic records, early
admission notification, and specific guidance about
major preparation and general education coursework.
5) Related report. The Campaign for College Opportunity
recently published a report, Keeping the Promise: Going the
Distance in Transfer Reform examining the implementation of
the Associate Degree for Transfer (ADT) legislation. The
report notes that of the approximately 2.3 million students
enrolled in the California Community Colleges system, only
4 percent (96,000 students) transferred to a four-year
university in 2013-14. The report also noted the
following:
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a) Latinos are better represented in the ADT
earner population than they are in the general
California State University (CSU) transfer population.
b) Ninety two percent of ADT earners in the CSU
system graduated or were still enrolled within two
years after enrolling.
c) ADT pathways are still not the primary
transfer pathway in California, with only about eight
percent of all CSU transfer students holding an
Associate Degree for Transfer in 2014-15.
d) Only 37 percent of Associate Degree for
Transfer earners transferred to a CSU on the
guaranteed pathway.
e) Four CSU campuses enrolled 66 percent of all
ADT students.
SUPPORT
Campaign for College Opportunity
OPPOSITION
None received.
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