BILL ANALYSIS Ó
AB 2815
Page 1
CONCURRENCE IN SENATE AMENDMENTS
AB
2815 (O'Donnell)
As Amended August 1, 2016
Majority vote
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|ASSEMBLY: |74-1 |(May 23, 2016) |SENATE: |38-0 |(August 15, |
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Original Committee Reference: ED.
SUMMARY: Authorizes a supervisor of attendance to provide
specified support services and take specified interventions.
Specifically, this bill:
1)Expresses the intent of the Legislature that in performing his
or her duties, a supervisor of attendance promotes a culture
of attendance and establishes a system to accurately track
pupil attendance in order to raise awareness of chronic
absenteeism, identify and address factors contributing to
chronic absenteeism and habitual truancy, and ensure that
pupils with attendance problems are identified as early as
possible in order to provide support services and
interventions.
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2)Authorizes a supervisor of attendance to provide support
services and interventions, including, but not limited to, any
or all of the following:
a) Hold a conference between school personnel, the pupil's
parent or guardian, and the pupil.
b) Promote cocurricular and extracurricular activities that
increase pupil connectedness to school, such as tutoring,
mentoring, the arts, service learning, or athletics.
c) Recognize pupils who achieve excellent attendance or
demonstrate significant improvement in attendance.
d) Refer a pupil to a school nurse, school counselor,
school psychologist, school social worker, and other pupil
support personnel for case management and counseling.
e) Collaborate with child welfare services, law
enforcement, courts, public health care agencies, or
government agencies, or medical, mental health, and oral
health care providers to receive necessary services.
f) Collaborate with school study teams, guidance teams,
school attendance review teams, or other
intervention-related teams to assess the attendance or
behavior problem in partnership with the pupil and his or
her parents, guardians, or caregivers.
g) Identify barriers to attendance that may require
schoolwide strategies rather than case management in
schools with significantly higher rates of chronic
absenteeism.
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h) Refer a pupil for a comprehensive psychosocial or
psychoeducational assessment, including for purposes of
creating an individualized education program for an
individual with exceptional needs, or plan adopted for a
qualified handicapped person as that term is defined in
regulations promulgated by the United States Department of
Education pursuant to federal Rehabilitation Act of 1973
Section 504 (29 United States Code Section 794).
i) Refer a pupil to a school attendance review board (SARB)
established by the county or by a school district or to the
probation department.
j) Refer a pupil to a truancy mediation program operated by
the county's district attorney or probation officer.
3)Clarifies that county means a county superintendent of
schools.
4)Replaces a reference to "board of school trustees of any
district of a county" with the "governing board of a school
district."
5)Strikes the reference to "receiving the approval of the county
board of education" in the authorization of a school district
to contract with the county superintendent of schools for the
supervision of the attendance of pupils in the school
district.
6)Makes minor, technical changes.
The Senate amendments correct a code section citation and
strike, in the intent section of the bill, the requirement that
the supervisor of attendance promote a culture of attendance and
establish a system to accurately track pupil attendance.
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FISCAL EFFECT: None. This bill is keyed non-fiscal by the
Legislative Counsel.
COMMENTS: Truancy. California's compulsory education law
requires all students between the ages of six and 18 to attend
school full-time and their parents and legal guardians to be
responsible for ensuring that children attend school. A student
who is absent from school without a valid excuse, is tardy for
more than 30 minutes, or any combination thereof, on three days
in a school year is considered a truant. Parents or legal
guardians are notified when their children has been classified
as a truant and are reminded of their obligation to compel the
attendance of pupils at school. Upon a pupil's third truancy
(five absences and/or tardiness for more than 30 minutes) in a
school year and following a district's conscientious effort to
hold a conference with the parent or legal guardian of the pupil
and the pupil, a pupil is classified as a habitual truant and
may be referred to a SARB or to the local probation officer.
Upon a fourth truancy, students and/or their parents or legal
guardians may be fined. In 2014-15, the California Department
of Education (CDE) reported a truancy rate of 31.43%, with 2
million students out of a total enrollment of 6.2 million
considered truants.
Students who are chronically absent in lower grades are much
less likely to be proficient readers and have higher levels of
suspensions. According to the CDE, chronic absence in the sixth
grade is the most predictive indicator that a student will not
graduate from high school.
In 2013, the Attorney General's (AG's) office released a report
titled "In School and On Track" on truancy of elementary school
kids. Calling it a crisis, the AG argues that truancy at the
elementary level has negative impacts on the students, who are
more likely to drop out of high school; on public safety, when
students become more likely to become involved with gangs,
substance abuse, and incarceration; on school districts, who
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lose attendance dollars; and on the economy, due to lost
economic productivity and revenues.
This bill expresses the intent of the Legislature for attendance
supervisors, in addition to establishing a system to accurately
track pupil attendance, to promote a culture of attendance in
order to raise the awareness of the effects of chronic
absenteeism and truancy and to identify and address factors
contributing to truancy and absenteeism.
According to the author, the purpose of this bill is to update
the education code on the duties of attendance supervisors,
which were established in 1976. Each district or county
superintendent of schools is required to appoint an attendance
supervisor and assistant attendance supervisors as necessary.
Historically, attendance supervisors have had an enforcement
role. Over the last several years, legislative and school-based
policies have shifted from tough disciplinary approaches to
strategies that focus on how to support students in order to
compel students to attend school and keep students at school.
Attendance supervisors play an important role in coordinating
and implementing these strategies, including those authorized by
this bill, such as making referrals to school- and
community-based services such as counseling, special education
services, SARBs, and social welfare, health, mental health, and
oral health services provided by local governmental agencies.
The strategies also include positive strategies, such as
recognizing students who have excellent attendance records or
students who significantly improve their attendance.
The strategies proposed by this bill were developed by the state
SARB, established to encourage the cooperation, coordination and
development of strategies to support county SARBs in carrying
out their responsibilities to establish district SARBs.
District and county SARBs, comprised of representatives from
schools, local services agencies, and local law enforcement
agencies, meet with referred pupils and their parents/legal
guardians to assess their personal and family situations that
may cause pupils to be tardy or absent from school on a regular
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basis and identify community/public resources that may help
pupils improve their attendance in school, or refer pupils to
law enforcement agencies, if necessary.
Superintendent Tom Torlakson, writing in support of the bill,
states, "While current law does recognize the importance of
attendance supervisors, it does not include a focus on
preventing truancy by improving school climate and analyzing
chronic absence data to provide early identification of
high-risk students for early intervention and access to
appropriate school and community services. Attendance
supervisors are key personnel in our efforts to reduce truancy
and chronic absenteeism, and establishing alternatives to
out-of-school suspensions." Analysis Prepared by: Sophia
Kwong Kim / ED. / (916) 319-2087 FN: 0003722