BILL ANALYSIS Ó
AB 2259
Page 1
Date of Hearing: April 6, 2016
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION
Patrick O'Donnell, Chair
AB 2259
(Medina) - As Introduced February 18, 2016
SUBJECT: School accountability: dropout recovery high schools
SUMMARY: Extends the sunset date for the requirement that the
Superintendent of Public Instruction (SPI) and the State Board
of Education (SBE), as part of the alternative accountability
system for schools, allow no more than 10 dropout recovery high
schools to report the results of an individual pupil growth
model instead of reporting other indicators. Specifically, this
bill:
1)Extends, from January 1, 2017 to January 1, 2020, a
requirement that the SPI and the SBE, as part of the
alternative accountability system for schools or any successor
system, allow no more than 10 dropout recovery high schools to
report the results of an individual pupil growth model that is
proposed by the school and certified by the SPI pursuant to
specified criteria, instead of reporting other indicators.
EXISTING LAW:
1)Requires the SPI, with approval of the SBE, to develop an
Academic Performance Index (API), as part of the Public School
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Performance Accountability Act (PSAA), to measure the
performance of schools and school districts, especially the
academic performance of pupils.
2)Requires the SPI, with approval of the SBE, to develop an
alternative accountability system for specified types of
schools, including community day schools and continuation
schools. Existing law allows these schools to receive an API
score, but prohibits them from being included in the API
rankings of schools.
3)Requires that the SPI and the SBE, as part of the alternative
accountability system for schools or any successor system, to
allow no more than 10 dropout recovery high schools, to report
the results of an individual pupil growth model that is
proposed by the school and certified by the SPI pursuant to
specified criteria, instead of reporting other indicators.
Sunsets this requirement on January 1, 2017. Specifies the
following criteria:
a) the model measures learning based on valid and reliable
nationally normed or criterion-referenced reading and
mathematics test
b) the model measures skills and knowledge aligned with
state standards
c) the model measures the extent to which a pupil scored
above an expected amount of growth based on the individual
pupil's initial achievement score
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d) the model demonstrates the extent to which a school is
able to accelerate learning on an annual basis
4)Defines a dropout recovery high school as one offering
instruction in any of grades 9 to 12, in which 50 percent or
more of its students are either designated as dropouts
pursuant to the exit and withdrawal codes developed by the
CDE, or left a school and were not otherwise enrolled in a
school for a period of at least 180 days, and the school
provides instruction in partnership with any of the following:
the federal Workforce Investment Act of 1998,
federally-affiliated Youthbuild programs, federal job corps
training, or the California Conservation Corps or local
conservation corps.
FISCAL EFFECT: Unknown
COMMENTS:
Need for the bill. The author states, "AB 2259 will allow
schools to apply for certification and ensure that an individual
growth model strategy remains available. This will help to
maintain an important component of the accountability system for
dropout recovery schools. Also, it allows the State Board of
Education and the Legislature to complete deliberations on
appropriate accountability."
Alternative School Accountability Model. This bill proposes
that to extend the sunset date for an authorization to allow
dropout recovery high schools to report the results of an
individual pupil growth model as part of the Alternative Schools
Accountability Model (ASAM).
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The ASAM was established by the Public Schools Accountability
Act of 1999. From 2003 to 2009, the state used the ASAM in lieu
of the API for alternative schools. Alternative schools could
choose any 3 of 14 performance indicators, including reading,
writing and mathematics achievement, credit and course
completion, suspension/expulsion, and student behavior.
Concerns regarding the inability to compare schools because of
the indicators chosen, and about the exclusion of students who
were enrolled for less than 90 days, led to an effort to reform
the system, but funding for the ASAM was eliminated in 2009,
making the system inoperative.
Why an individual pupil growth model? Dropout recovery high
schools serve students whose skills are generally far below
grade-level, and enter and exit high school on an irregular
schedule. For these reasons, using an annual "point in time"
measure to gauge the performance of these schools does not yield
useful data, particularly for evaluation of a school's
performance.
To get a more accurate picture of student and school
achievement, current law authorizes the state to instead use an
individual pupil growth model, which measures student growth
over time relative to grade level content standards, using
nationally normed assessments.
According to the author, CDE has not yet certified an individual
pupil growth model authorized by current law. The authorizing
legislation for this model was enacted after the ASAM was made
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inoperative. This why current law speaks to the use of the
individual pupil growth model in the ASAM or "any successor
system."
State and federal accountability system under construction. The
SBE is in the process of designing a new accountability system
for the state's schools, built on the foundation of the Local
Control Funding Formula (LCFF), Local Control and Accountability
Plans (LCAPs), evaluation rubrics, and the California
Collaborative for Educational Excellence (CCEE). Under current
law, the SBE must adopt evaluation rubrics by October 1, 2016.
The SBE also intends to align this new system with the
requirements of the new federal Every Student Succeeds Act
(ESSA). The new system will be designed using multiple measures
and will represent a continuous improvement framework.
When the state developed the prior accountability system, and
built the Academic Performance Index (API), it created the ASAM
after designing the accountability system for traditional
schools. This sequence will likely again be the case for the
new accountability system now under construction.
LAO report on alternative school accountability. A 2015 report
by the Legislative Analyst's Office found that the state does
not have sufficient information to determine how well
alternative schools are educating students, and recommended that
the state 1) collect better performance data for alternative
schools and then use this information to set performance
expectations, 2) monitor their progress toward meeting those
expectations, and 3) support underperforming schools.
The Analyst notes that annual standardized test scores are not a
good measure student achievement in alternative schools because
they enroll for less than a year. The Analyst also notes that
current dropout and graduation rate data are also not useful
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because they do not reflect transfers back to traditional
schools, and that a four-year cohort graduation rate does not
work for alternative schools because students seldom enroll for
four years.
Amend a section which is inoperative? The SBE suspended the API
starting in the 2014-15 academic year, essentially making the
PSAA statutes inoperative. The authorization for the use of the
individual pupil growth model is located in those inoperative
sections. The Committee may wish to consider whether these
sections should be established as part of a separate section,
outside of the PSAA, as these sections may at some point be
repealed.
Prior legislation. AB 1668 (Carter, Chapter 424, Statutes of
2012) revised the definition of a dropout recovery high school.
AB 180 (Carter, Chapter 669, Statutes of 2011) authorized a
dropout recovery high school growth measure as part of the PSAA
or any successor alternate accountability system.
AB 2307 (Carter) of the 2009-10 Session, was similar to AB 180
(Carter) of the 2011-2012 Session, and was held in the Senate
Appropriations Committee.
REGISTERED SUPPORT / OPPOSITION:
Support
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School for Integrated Academics and Technologies (SIATech)
(Sponsor)
Association of California School Administrators
Opposition
None received
Analysis Prepared by:Tanya Lieberman / ED. / (916) 319-2087