BILL ANALYSIS Ó
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|SENATE RULES COMMITTEE | SB 42|
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VETO
Bill No: SB 42
Author: Liu (D)
Amended: 9/2/15
Vote: 21
SENATE EDUCATION COMMITTEE: 8-0, 3/25/15
AYES: Liu, Huff, Block, Hancock, Leyva, Mendoza, Pan, Vidak
SENATE APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE: 6-1, 5/28/15
AYES: Lara, Bates, Beall, Hill, Leyva, Mendoza
NOES: Nielsen
SENATE FLOOR: 38-1, 6/1/15
AYES: Allen, Anderson, Bates, Beall, Berryhill, Block,
Cannella, De León, Fuller, Gaines, Galgiani, Glazer, Hall,
Hancock, Hernandez, Hertzberg, Hill, Hueso, Huff, Jackson,
Lara, Leno, Leyva, Liu, McGuire, Mendoza, Mitchell, Monning,
Moorlach, Morrell, Nguyen, Pan, Pavley, Roth, Stone, Vidak,
Wieckowski, Wolk
NOES: Nielsen
NO VOTE RECORDED: Runner
SENATE FLOOR: 38-0, 9/10/15
AYES: Allen, Anderson, Bates, Beall, Berryhill, Block,
Cannella, De León, Fuller, Gaines, Galgiani, Glazer, Hall,
Hancock, Hernandez, Hertzberg, Hill, Hueso, Huff, Jackson,
Lara, Leno, Leyva, Liu, McGuire, Mendoza, Monning, Moorlach,
Nguyen, Nielsen, Pan, Pavley, Roth, Runner, Stone, Vidak,
Wieckowski, Wolk
NO VOTE RECORDED: Mitchell, Morrell
ASSEMBLY FLOOR: 73-4, 9/8/15 - See last page for vote
SUBJECT: Postsecondary education: Office of Higher Education
Performance and Accountability
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SOURCE: Author
DIGEST: This bill establishes the Office of Higher Education
Performance and Accountability as the statewide postsecondary
coordination and planning entity, outlines its responsibilities,
functions and authorities, and establishes an advisory board to
the office (comprised of legislative appointees) to examine and
make recommendations regarding its functions and operations, and
to review and comment on the office's recommendations to the
Governor and Legislature.
ANALYSIS:
Existing law:
1)Establishes the CPEC to be responsible for coordinating
public, independent, and private postsecondary education in
California and to provide independent policy analysis and
recommendations to the Legislature and the Governor on
postsecondary education policy. (Education Code § 66900 et.
seq.)
2)Prescribes the composition of CPEC to include the following 17
members:
a) One representative from each of the following bodies:
i) The University of California (UC) Regents.
ii) The California State University (CSU) Trustees.
iii) The California Community Colleges (CCC) Board of
Governors.
iv) The Association of Independent Colleges and
Universities.
b) The chair or designee of the Council for Private
Postsecondary and Vocational Education.
c) The President or designee of the State Board of
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Education.
d) Nine representatives of the general public, with three
appointed by the Governor, three by the Senate Rules
Committee, and three by the Speaker of the Assembly.
e) Two student representatives. (EC § 66901)
This bill establishes the OHEPA as the statewide postsecondary
education planning and coordination entity. It:
1)Establishes the OHEPA within the Governor's Office and:
a) Places the OHEPA under the direct control of an
Executive Director appointed by the Governor and subject to
Senate confirmation.
b) Provides that the Executive Director is responsible for
all duties, powers, and responsibilities vested in the
OHEPA, including contracting for relevant professional or
consultant services
c) Requires the Director to appoint any staff positions
authorized by the Governor.
2)Establishes an Advisory Board to the OHEPA, and:
a) Requires that the Board:
i) Meet at least quarterly,
ii) Be subject to open meeting requirements.
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iii) Review and comment on any recommendations made by
the OHEPA to the Governor and the Legislature.
iv) Develop an annual report on the condition of
California higher education.
v) Issue an annual performance review of the Director.
b) Provides that Board members shall serve without
compensation, except reimbursement for expenses.
c) Prescribes its membership as follows:
i) Three members with experience in postsecondary
education appointed by the Senate Committee on Rules;
ii) Three members with experience in postsecondary
education appointed by the Speaker of the Assembly; and,
iii) The chair of the Senate Committee on Education and
the chair of the Assembly Committee on Higher Education
to serve as ex officio members.
3)Requires the OHEPA to actively seek input from and consult
with the advisory board and higher education segments and
stakeholders, as appropriate, in the conduct of its duties and
responsibilities.
4)Declares that the OHEPA exists for the purpose of advising the
Governor, the Legislature and other appropriate government
officials and institutions of postsecondary education and
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outlines its functions and responsibilities. It:
a) Requires, through its use of information and its
analytic capacity, that it inform the identification and
periodic revision of state goals and priorities for higher
education consistent with the existing goals and metrics
outlined in statute by SB 195 (Liu, Chapter 367, Statutes
of 2013) and in the 2013-14 and 2014-15 Budget Acts, and
that it biennially evaluate both statewide and
institutional performance in relation to these goals and
priorities.
b) Requires that it review and make recommendations
regarding cross-segmental and interagency initiatives and
programs in areas that include, but are not limited to,
efficiencies in instructional delivery, financial aid,
transfer, and workforce coordination.
c) Requires that it advise the Legislature and the Governor
regarding the need for, and location of, new institutions
and campuses of public higher education.
d) Requires that it review proposals by the public segments
for new programs, as specified, and make recommendations
regarding those proposals to the Legislature and the
Governor.
e) Requires that it act as a clearinghouse for
postsecondary education information and as a primary source
of information for the Legislature, the Governor, and other
agencies.
f) Requires that it develop and maintain a comprehensive
database that ensures data compatibility, supports
longitudinal studies, is compatible with K-12 data systems,
provides Internet access to data for the sectors of higher
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education in order to support statewide, segmental and
individual campus educational research needs.
g) Requires that it review all proposals for changes in
eligibility pools for admission to public institutions and
segments of postsecondary education and that it
periodically conduct eligibility studies.
h) Requires that it manage data systems and maintain
programmatic, policy, and fiscal expertise to receive and
aggregate information reported by the institutions of
higher education in this state.
5)Authorizes the OHEPA to require the governing boards and the
institutions of public postsecondary education to submit data
to the office on plans, programs, costs, student selection and
retention, enrollments, and other specified information, and
requires the Office to furnish information concerning these
matters to the Legislature and Governor as requested by them.
6)Requires the OHEPA to annually report to the Legislature and
the Governor regarding its progress in achieving the
aforementioned objectives and responsibilities by December
31st of ear year.
7)Requires the LAO to review and report to the Legislature
regarding the performance of the OHEPA in fulfilling its
functions and responsibilities.by January 1, 2020.
8)Sunsets these provisions on January 1, 2021.
Comments
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1)Need for the bill. California's education and workforce needs
cannot be addressed by any single segment. According to the
author, the state's approach to higher education must become
more comprehensive if it is to ensure state-level workforce
needs and priorities are being met. Numerous reports,
including legislative reviews of the Master Plan for Higher
Education and more recent reports from higher education
experts, have called for California to establish a central
higher education body. This central body is an important
element of the state's ability to honor its promise of
affordable, high quality postsecondary education for all high
school graduates and adults who could benefit from instruction
offered at California's colleges and universities. Without
such an entity, California cannot systematically plan to
address the current and future needs of all its students and
the overall economy.
This bill represents the next necessary step in establishing
greater clarity and accountability for our higher education
system's performance in meeting the statewide goals for
postsecondary education (SB 195, Liu, Chapter 367, Statutes of
2013) of equity, access, and success; alignment with workforce
needs; and the effective and efficient use of resources. This
bill reflects national trends, recommendations from several
recent reports, and recommendations by the Legislative
Analyst.
2)Related reports/recommendations. A number of recent reports
have cited the need for an independent body to steward a
public agenda for higher education. These include the
following:
a) Improving Higher Education Oversight (Legislative
Analyst's Office (LAO), January 2012) - In this report, the
LAO raised concerns that in the wake of CPEC's closure, the
future of higher education oversight was unclear. The LAO
noted that while the public segments had stepped in to
assume some roles previously performed by CPEC, they
expressed concerns about how institutional and public
interests would be balanced. The LAO also noted that while
CPEC's performance had been problematic, several important
functions performed by CPEC had been lost. Among other
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things, the LAO recommended the Legislature re-establish an
independent oversight body and increase the body's
independence from the public higher education segments,
assign the body with limited and clear responsibilities,
and develop a more unified governing board appointment
process.
b) Charting a Course for California's Colleges: State
Leadership in Higher Education (California Competes,
February 2014) - The report noted that California is one of
only two states nationwide (the other being Michigan)
without comprehensive oversight or coordination of higher
education. The report opined that the state needs an
independent agency to develop a public agenda for higher
education that links the needs of the state's economy to
the degree attainment outputs of the state's institutions.
Further, that independence means that the entity would not
have representatives of the segments on its decision-making
body to allow it to maintain its impartiality. Finally,
the report recommended that the state's priorities be
focused on the goals of access to quality programs and
outcomes from those programs; that the entity should be a
coordinating agency and the segments should remain
autonomous; and that its primary functions should be
planning and policy development, data collection, analysis
and monitoring, and administration of state financial aid
programs.
c) A New Vision for California Higher Education: A Model
Public Agenda (Institute for Higher Education Leadership
and Policy, March 2014) - The report highlights the
challenges faced by California and offers a model public
agenda centered on these goals: addressing access and
attainment; equity, affordability and efficiency; and state
policy leadership. As regards policy leadership, the report
opines that this function is best filled by an executive
branch entity, such as a California Office of Higher
Education, that reports to the Governor. The
responsibilities of this office would be to, among other
things, provide policy leadership and advise the Governor
on higher education budget and policy development,
administer financial aid programs, manage a coordinated
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higher education data system that allows for analysis of
enrollments, progression, and completion across all public
segments, manage a higher education accountability process,
and conduct analysis of goals and targets to assess how
well regional efforts aggregate to meet statewide goals.
FISCAL EFFECT: Appropriation: No Fiscal
Com.:YesLocal: Yes
According to the Assembly Appropriations Committee, in its last
full year of operation, CPEC's General Fund operating budget was
$1.9 million for the equivalent of 18 positions. The new office
established in this bill would likely have a somewhat smaller
budget. In addition, the office would incur one-time information
technology costs and other start-up costs in the low hundreds of
thousands of dollars. The three public higher education segments
report the following costs to work with the new office and to
respond to data requests:
1)UC. Ongoing costs of $50,000 for one-half position.
2)CSU. Ongoing costs of $110,000 for one position.
3)CCC. Estimates ongoing costs of up to $440,000 for four
positions, based on prior workload demands involving CPEC.
SUPPORT: (Verified11/9/15)
California Competes
California Faculty Association
Campaign for College Opportunity
Little Hoover Commission
OPPOSITION: (Verified11/9/15)
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None received
GOVERNOR'S VETO MESSAGE:
I am returning Senate Bill 42 without my signature.
This bill would establish an Office of Higher Education
Performance and Accountability to advise the Governor and
Legislature on state goals and priorities for higher
education. The bill would also create an advisory board
consisting of legislators and others to be appointed by the
Legislature to annually review the performance of this
office, which would sunset by the end of 2020.
The call to improve postsecondary educational outcomes is
laudable. The goals established by SB 195 in 2013 -
improving access and success, aligning degrees and
credentials with the state's economic, workforce and civic
needs, and ensuring the effective and efficient use of
resources - are still important measures that should guide
us in developing higher education policies for the state.
While there is much work to be done to improve higher
education, I am not convinced we need a new office and an
advisory board, especially of the kind this bill proposes,
to get the job done.
ASSEMBLY FLOOR: 73-4, 9/8/15
AYES: Achadjian, Alejo, Travis Allen, Baker, Bigelow, Bloom,
Bonilla, Bonta, Brough, Brown, Burke, Calderon, Campos, Chang,
Chau, Chiu, Chu, Cooley, Cooper, Dababneh, Daly, Dodd,
Frazier, Gallagher, Cristina Garcia, Eduardo Garcia, Gipson,
Gomez, Gonzalez, Gordon, Gray, Grove, Hadley, Harper, Roger
Hernández, Holden, Irwin, Jones, Jones-Sawyer, Kim, Lackey,
Linder, Lopez, Low, Maienschein, Mathis, Mayes, McCarty,
Medina, Mullin, Nazarian, Obernolte, O'Donnell, Olsen,
Patterson, Perea, Quirk, Rendon, Ridley-Thomas, Rodriguez,
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Salas, Santiago, Steinorth, Mark Stone, Thurmond, Ting,
Wagner, Waldron, Weber, Wilk, Williams, Wood, Atkins
NOES: Beth Gaines, Gatto, Levine, Melendez
NO VOTE RECORDED: Chávez, Dahle, Eggman
Prepared by:Kathleen Chavira / ED. / (916) 651-4105
11/13/15 16:03:40
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