BILL ANALYSIS Ó AB 2237 Page 1 Date of Hearing: April 13, 2016 ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION Patrick O'Donnell, Chair AB 2237 (Olsen) - As Amended March 18, 2016 SUBJECT: Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics Partnership Academies SUMMARY: Establishes the Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) Partnership Academies program, for the purpose of providing grants to school districts to establish up to 100 partnership academies in STEM occupations. Specifically, this bill: 1)Makes findings and declarations relative to the importance of high-quality STEM education in the classroom. 2)Requires, beginning with the 2016-17 school year, the California Department of Education (CDE), in coordination with the State Superintendent of Public Instruction (SPI), to issue grants for the establishment of 100 partnership academies dedicated to training young people in STEM occupations, including: a) application software developer AB 2237 Page 2 b) computer user support specialist c) computer programmer d) computer hardware engineer e) industrial engineer f) civil engineer g) architectural engineer h) aerospace engineer i) dietetic technician j) medical scientist aa) microbiologist bb) general medical practitioner cc) dental services provider dd) chemist AB 2237 Page 3 3)Requires the selection of school districts to establish STEM partnership academies, and the planning and development of these academies, to be consistent with current requirements for partnership academies. 4)Authorizes school districts applying to convert existing school programs into STEM partnership academies to receive first-year implementation funds. 5)Requires that in order to receive funding for the purposes of this bill, each proposed partnership academy meet the following requirements: a) Coursework and internship or pre-apprenticeship programs which focus significant time on the use of emerging technologies and state-of-the-art equipment. b) Staff development opportunities to ensure that teaching staff have the opportunity to be trained in the use of emerging technologies and become familiar with new equipment and current practices in STEM fields. EXISTING LAW: 1)Establishes the California Partnership Academies (CPA) program as a state-school-private sector partnership to provide combined academic and occupational training to eligible at-risk students in grades 10-12, inclusive. 2)Establishes funding and grant amounts to be awarded to school districts for purposes of planning, establishing and maintaining academies, and expresses legislative intent to AB 2237 Page 4 expand the CPA program. 3)Requires the SPI to ensure that the planning grants are equitably distributed among high-wealth and low-wealth school districts in urban, rural, and suburban areas. 4)Requires districts and participating businesses to each provide 100% matching funds for all state funds received; provides that the match may be in the form of direct and in-kind support; and requires the district to establish an advisory committee consisting of specified individuals and representatives. 5)Requires each district operating academies to annually certify information to the SPI regarding the number of qualified students enrolled during the just completed school year, by grade level, and for each academy operated by the district. 6)Establishes the Green Technology Partnership Academies and the Goods Movement Partnership Academies, commencing with the 2009-10 school year, and requires, when funds become available for additional partnership academies, the SPI to issue grants for the establishment of such partnership academies in each of the nine economic regions established by the state. FISCAL EFFECT: Unknown COMMENTS: Need for the bill. The author's office states, "Right now, not enough of our youth have access to quality STEM learning opportunities, and too few students see these disciplines as AB 2237 Page 5 springboards for their careers. Although 81 percent of Asian-American high school students and 71 percent of Caucasian high school students attend high schools where the full range of math and science courses are offered, access to these courses for American Indian, Native Alaskan, African-America and Hispanic high school students is significantly worse. A child's race, zip code, or socioeconomic status should never determine their STEM fluency. Children must be provided with the opportunity to be career and college-ready and to thrive in a modern STEM economy. Furthermore, only 16 percent of American high school seniors are proficient in math and interested in a STEM career. Even among those who do go on to pursue a college major in the STEM fields, only about half choose to work in a related career. By providing funding for 100 STEM Partnership Academies, AB 2237 would provide stronger access to quality STEM learning opportunities in school so that students are better prepared for the jobs and careers of the future." Overview of California Partnership Academies. A CPA is a small learning community within a larger high school that contains college-preparatory curriculum organized around a career-related theme. Under the CPA model, a team of teachers work with the same group of students over several years, aligning instruction across disciplines, while employers provide internships and other opportunities for students to learn outside the classroom. Each CPA frames its curriculum around one of the 15 industry fields established for Career Technical Education by the CDE. The most common themes are Health Science and Medical Technology; Arts, Media and Entertainment; Finance and Business; Engineering and Design; and Public Services. According to a report prepared for the CDE by the Career Academy AB 2237 Page 6 Support Network at UC Berkeley, 467 CPAs submitted reports to the CDE for the 2009-10 school year. These academies operated in 278 of the state's 1,264 comprehensive high schools. Most high schools with CPAs ranked below average on the state's Academic Performance Index. The 437 CPAs that provided student-level data enrolled 48,436 students in grades 10-12-about 3% of the state's 1.6 million students in these grades. CPAs serve 36 of California's 58 counties, and the state's six most populous counties-Los Angeles, Sacramento, Alameda, Riverside, San Diego, and Contra Costa-have a total of 287 CPAs. In order to receive the full amount of state funding, an academy must show that at least 50% of the students in each incoming class of CPA sophomores meet three of the following six "at-risk" criteria: 1) having a poor attendance record; 2) being significantly behind in credits; 3) demonstrating low motivation for the regular school program; 4) being economically disadvantaged; 5) having low state test scores; or 6) having a low grade point average. CPA students are 53% female and 47% male. CPA student gender balances vary considerably among industry sectors, from Fashion and Interior Design (2 academies) which is 79% female to Manufacturing and Product Development (8 academies) which is 78% male. Compared to the state as a whole, CPAs enroll larger percentages of Hispanic and African American students: 59% of students enrolled are Hispanic, 16% are Caucasian, 10% are Asian, and 9% are African American. Focus on CTE in California has grown. With dramatic changes in industry and workforce demands, as well as renewed focus on supporting career readiness, policymakers, business leaders and educators have enacted numerous reforms to increase student access to CTE courses in recent years. AB 2237 Page 7 In addition to the Regional Occupational Centers and Programs (ROC/Ps) and the CPAs, the Legislature recently established the Career Pathways Trust and the CTE Incentive Grant programs. The Legislature has also made courses in CTE an option to meet state graduation requirements. In January, 2013, the SBE adopted revised CTE Model Curriculum Standards, which reflect the specific conditions and expectations of each industry sector. The standards are organized into 15 industry sectors, which each contain three to seven different pathway learning approaches. Underrepresentation in STEM education. STEM education includes four specific disciplines-science, technology, engineering, and mathematics-in an interdisciplinary and applied approach. STEM teaches and trains students to engage in critical thinking, inquiry, problem solving, collaboration, and what is often referred to in engineering as design thinking. In recent years the state has undertaken a number of policy reforms to address STEM teaching and assessment practices, curriculum, and policies that expand STEM opportunities for all students. According to a 2009 report from the Institute for Higher Education Leadership & Policy at California State University, Sacramento titled Technical Difficulties: Meeting California's Workforce Needs in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) Fields, the supply of STEM-educated workers is not keeping pace with the employment demand in STEM fields. To ensure that there are enough STEM workers, the report concluded that increasing STEM achievement by underrepresented groups is essential. The report noted that only three percent of STEM majors in the state are African-American, and 18% are Latino. The gender gap in many STEM fields has been widely recognized for years, and in several fields has remained stagnant or worsened in recent years. This gap is reflected in CTE STEM programs at the high school level, degree attainment in higher education and employment in STEM professions: AB 2237 Page 8 According to the U.S. Department of Education, girls are significantly less likely to be enrolled in CTE programs which focus on STEM occupations. The Department reports that in 2009-2010, girls made up only 24% of enrollment in science, technology, engineering, and math CTE programs nationally. Women remain far less likely to earn STEM degrees in several fields, including engineering and computer science, and this gap has remained relatively stagnant over the last ten years. According to the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, between 2004 and 2014 women earned bachelor's degrees in engineering at the rate of 20% and 19% respectively, and the rate of degrees earned in computer sciences dropped from 23% to 18% over that decade. The U.S. Department of Labor reports that in the occupation of computer programmer (one of the professions specified in this bill), women represent only 23% of the workforce in 2012, a slight decline from the rate of 25% in 2002. The representation of women in a number of engineering professions is even lower, from 1% to 18%. Current law requires the SPI to ensure that CPA planning grants are equitably distributed among high-wealth and low-wealth school districts in urban, rural, and suburban areas. The law also requires that at least 50% of students enrolled in partnership academy are "at-risk." However, current law and this bill do not require programs to address issues of underrepresentation in the fields for which they are preparing AB 2237 Page 9 students. Staff recommends an amendment requiring the SPI to grant priority to STEM Partnership Academy proposals, authorized by this bill, that address the participation of students traditionally underrepresented in STEM education and professions. Sources of CPA support. There are three sources of supplemental support for CPAs: grants from the state; financial or in-kind support from the host district, required to be at least equal to the State grant; and financial or in-kind contributions from local employers, also required to be at least equal to the state grant. The state grant is therefore leveraged at least two-to-one by local matching contributions. In total, state grants amounted to $26.5 million in 2009-10, while school districts matches totaled $41.3 million and employer matches totaled $48.3 million. Thus, on average, CPAs received about 23% of their supplemental support from state grant funds, 35% in matching district support, and 42% in matching employer contributions. This bill is an expansion of one of the few categorical programs left in the era of the Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF). With the establishment of the LCFF in 2013, approximately three-quarters of all categorical programs were eliminated, and the funds previously dedicated for the programs were incorporated into the LCFF. The retention of this program indicates the Legislature's priority to maintain a separate and dedicated funding stream for CPAs. State-of-the-art requirement may disadvantage some areas. This bill requires that in order to be eligible for funding, each proposed partnership academy must focus significant time on the use of emerging technologies and state-of-the-art equipment, as well on staff development to ensure that teachers are familiar with how to use the equipment. The Committee may wish to consider if all districts competing for the grants established AB 2237 Page 10 by this bill will have the equal means to provide use of this, presumably, very expensive equipment and technology. Arguments in support: Microsoft Corporation writes, "By providing funding for 100 STEM Partnership Academies, AB 2237 would provide stronger access to quality STEM learning opportunities in schools so that students are better prepared for the jobs and careers of the future. We believe AB 2237 is an important tool in preparing students for careers in the knowledge-based economy." Implementation date. The bill authorizes the CDE to issue grants for the establishment of 100 partnership academies starting in the 2016-17 school year. If this bill is enacted it will require an appropriation, which would not be available until July 2017. Staff recommends that this bill be amended to delay the establishment of the partnership academies until the 2017-18 school year. Related legislation: AB 2072 (Chang) of this Session would establish the State Seal of STEM, to be affixed to high school diplomas of qualified students, to recognize students who have attained a high level of proficiency in the STEM subjects. This bill is currently pending in this Committee. AB 2275 (Dababneh) of this Session would authorize a person who holds a single subject credential in business, industrial and technology education, mathematics or science to teach courses in computer science. This bill is currently pending in this Committee. AB 2329 (Bonilla) of this Session establishes a computer science strategic implementation advisory board to develop a K-12 computer science strategic implementation plan. This bill is AB 2237 Page 11 approved by this Committee on a vote of 7-0 and has been referred to the Assembly Appropriations Committee. AB 1258 (Chau) of this Session would have established a Computer Science Start-Up Courses Grant Pilot Program and a Computer Science Educator Training Grant Pilot program, for the purposes of providing grants to school districts to establish and maintain computer science courses and provide professional development for educators to teach computer science. This bill was held in Senate Appropriations Committee. AB 252 (Holden) of this Session would have established a grant program to award funds to cover the costs associated with a high school establishing or expanding its Advanced Placement STEM curriculum. This bill was held in Senate Appropriations Committee. Prior legislation: SB 1354 (Hancock), Chapter 650, Statutes of 2010, revised the criteria for identifying pupils that are "at risk" for purposes of enrollment in California Partnership Academies and required school districts to provide an assurance that each CPA pupil will be provided with career technical education courses that are part of an occupational course sequence that targets comprehensive skills and meets specified requirements. AB 2855 (Hancock), Chapter 685, Statutes of 2008, establishes, commencing with the 2009-10 school year, the Green Technology Partnership Academies and the Goods Movement Partnership Academies as two new categories of CPAs. AB 999 (Hancock) of the 2007-08 Session would have established, commencing with the 2008-09 school year, the Green Technology Partnership Academies and the Goods Movement Partnership AB 2237 Page 12 Academies as two new categories of CPAs. This bill was held in the Assembly Appropriations Committee. SB 830 (Kehoe) of the 2007-08 Session would have provided for the expansion of the number of CPAs, revised funding formulas and requirements for school districts operating academies, and revised the eligibility criteria to allow for the participation of 9th grade students. This bill was held in the Assembly Appropriations Committee. AB 2529 and AB 1570 (Salinas) of the 2005-06 Session, would have expanded the CPAs, changed the per-pupil and per-academy grant amounts, and revised student eligibility criteria and district requirements for participation. These bills were held in the Assembly and Senate Appropriations Committees, respectively. REGISTERED SUPPORT / OPPOSITION: Support Microsoft Corporation Opposition None received AB 2237 Page 13 Analysis Prepared by:Christine Aurre and Tanya Lieberman / ED. / (916) 319-2087