BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SENATE COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION
Senator Carol Liu, Chair
2015 - 2016 Regular
Bill No: AB 2621
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|Author: |Gomez |
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|Version: |May 31, 2016 Hearing |
| |Date: June 8, 2016 |
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|Urgency: |No |Fiscal: |No |
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|Consultant:|Lenin DelCastillo |
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Subject: Employee Codes of Conduct
SUMMARY
This bill requires a local educational agency (LEA) or an entity
providing private school instruction that maintains an employee
code of conduct to provide a written copy of that document to
the parent or guardian of each enrolled student at the beginning
of each school year and also post it on their Web site.
BACKGROUND
Current law:
1) Provides that under the existing Child Abuse and Neglect
Reporting Act, all school district teachers and employees
are considered to be "mandated reporters," including
instructional aides, teacher assistants, classified
employees, and employees of a school district police or
security department. Requires mandated reporters report to
any law enforcement department knowledge or observations
they may have of a child they know or reasonably suspect to
have been the subject of child abuse or neglect. The
individual report must be made by telephone immediately or
as soon as practicable with a written or electronic follow
up within 36 hours.
2) Specifies that employers are strongly encouraged to provide
their employees who are mandated reporters with training in
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the duties imposed, including training in child abuse and
neglect identification and training in child abuse and
neglect reporting. School districts that do not train
their employees in the duties of mandated reporters are
required to report to the California Department of
Education (CDE) the reasons why this training is not
provided.
3) Requires any mandated reporter, with the exception of child
visitation monitors, prior to commencing his or her
employment, to sign a statement on a form (provided by the
employer) to the effect that he or she has knowledge of the
mandated reporting procedures and will comply with those
provisions. Further, current law provides that the
statement shall inform the employee that he or she is a
mandated reporter and inform the employee of his or her
reporting obligations and confidentiality rights. (Penal
Code § 11164, et seq.)
4) Requires each school district and county office of
education to be responsible for the overall development of
all comprehensive school safety plans for its schools. The
schoolsite council is required to write and develop a
comprehensive school safety plan relevant to the needs and
resources of that particular school. (Education Code §
32281)
5) Requires the comprehensive school safety plan to include
(1) an assessment of the current status of school crime
committed on school campuses and at school-related
functions and (2) identification of appropriate strategies
and programs that will provide or maintain a high level of
school safety and detail procedures for complying with
existing laws; disaster procedures; policies regarding
suspension or expulsion; a discrimination and harassment
policy; and, a safe and orderly environment conducive to
learning. (EC § 32282)
6) Requires the comprehensive school safety plan to be
evaluated at least once a year. (EC § 32282)
7) Requires the schoolsite council or school safety planning
committee to hold a public meeting to allow public comment,
and requires the notification of specified people and
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entities prior to this meeting. Current law requires each
school to submit its school safety plan to the school
district or county office of education for approval and
requires a school district or County Office Education to
notify the California Department of Education (CDE) by
October 15 of every year of any school that is not in
compliance. (EC § 32288)
8) Requires each school to include a description of key
elements of the school safety plan in the annual school
accountability report card.
(EC § 32286)
9) Current law requires, if the Superintendent of Public
Instruction determines that there has been a willful
failure to make any report required in school safety plan
statutes to do both of the following:
a) Notify the school district or county office of
education in which the willful failure has occurred.
b) Make an assessment of up to $2,000 against that
school or county office, which may be done by
deducting funding from the district's or county
office's future apportionment. (EC § 32287)
10) Requires the State Office of Child Abuse Prevention to
develop and disseminate information to all school districts
and district school personnel regarding the detection of
child abuse. The information may be disseminated by the
use of literature, as deemed suitable by the CDE. Staff
development seminars and any other appropriate means of
instructing school personnel in the detection of child
abuse and neglect and the proper action that school
personnel should take in suspected cases of child abuse and
neglect shall be developed by the CDE.
11) Encourages local educational agencies to participate in
training on the prevention of abuse, including sexual
abuse, of children on school grounds, by personnel, or
in school-sponsored programs, and are also encouraged to provide
all school employees with that training at least once every
three years.
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(Education Code § 44691)
ANALYSIS
This bill:
1) Requires a local educational agency (LEA), or a person,
firm, association, partnership, or corporation offering or
conducting private school instruction at the elementary or
high school level, that maintains an employee code of
conduct with pupils, to provide a written copy of that
document to the parent or guardian of each enrolled pupil
at the beginning of each school year.
2) Requires the LEA or entity offering or conducting private
school instruction to post the employee code of conduct on
each of its school's Web sites or, if a school within the
LEA does not have its own Web site, to post it on the LEA's
Web site in a manner that is accessible to the public
without a password.
3) Provides that an LEA may satisfy the requirement to provide
a written copy to the parent or guardian by including the
document in the existing parental notification required
pursuant to Education Code § 48980.
4) Defines an LEA as a school district, county office of
education, or charter school.
5) Specifies that the bill's provisions shall not be construed
to require an LEA, a school, or a private school to create
a Web site if it does not have one.
6) Provides that the bill's provisions do not apply to a
private school composed of parents or legal guardians
working exclusively with their own children.
STAFF COMMENTS
1) Need for the bill. The author's office indicates that
"parents and students are not always aware of the many
codes of conduct that apply to teachers. Schools across
California have different forms of the code of conduct with
students. School employees may be engaging in seemingly
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ordinary events with students that the parent is aware of
and it could be violating the code of conduct. Events like
meeting off campus for coffee to discuss a term paper,
being friends on social media, or even providing a pupil a
ride home from school can appear innocent, but could easily
provide a venue for traumatic incidents such as sexual
assault."
2) Purpose of the documents. According to information
provided by the author's office, this bill is intended to
address an incident that occurred at a private school in
which a teacher "had a series of incidents where he was
slowly going beyond an understood but undocumented code of
conduct with students. The teacher gradually escalated his
inappropriate conduct and in a few circumstances would
engage in a sexual relationship with his students." The
author's office indicates that requiring schools to
distribute their codes of conduct, if they have one, may
help reduce the incidents of inappropriate behavior and
thereby protect students and other teachers or school
employees.
3) Existing training. While it is unclear how wide spread the
availability of child abuse prevention materials may be,
there are some online training programs currently
available. These training materials focus on training
teachers on what types of behavior may cross the line in
terms of appropriateness and provide examples of behavior
that could protect the teacher from false child abuse
claims. Examples include not sending personal emails and
texts to students, not giving students rides in cars, and
not being alone in a classroom with a student without the
door open. Schools may already incorporate any of this
child abuse prevention training into existing mandated
reporter training activities.
4) Previous legislation.
AB 1058 (Baker, Chapter 748, Statutes of 2015) required the
California Department of Education (CDE) to establish
guidelines and best practices for child abuse prevention
and post on its Web site links to existing training
resources. Additionally, this bill encourages school
districts, county offices of education (COEs) and charter
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schools to participate in child abuse prevention training
and provide all school employees with training in child
abuse prevention at least every three years.
AB 1432 (Gatto, Chapter 797, Statutes of 2014) required
school districts to annually train employees on their
duties regarding the mandated reporting when child abuse
and neglect is suspected.
AB 135 (Buchanan) from 2014 would have required LEAs to
adopt policies and provide employees with regular reminders
of their responsibilities as mandated reporters. This
measure failed passage in the Senate Appropriations
Committee.
AB 1338 (Buchanan) from 2013 would have required the
governing board of a school district and county office of
education (COE) and the governing body of a charter school,
to adopt a policy on the reporting of child abuse and the
responsibilities of mandated reporters in accordance with
the Child Abuse and Neglect and Reporting Act (CANRA) and
review the mandated reporting requirements with all school
personnel within the first six weeks of each school year.
This measure failed passage in the Assembly Appropriations
Committee.
SUPPORT
None received.
OPPOSITION
None received.
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