BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SENATE COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION
Senator Carol Liu, Chair
2015 - 2016 Regular
Bill No: SB 320
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|Author: |Lara |
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|Version: |March 26, 2015 Hearing |
| |Date: April 22, 2015 |
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|Urgency: |No |Fiscal: |Yes |
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|Consultant:|Olgalilia Ramirez |
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Subject: Pupil fees: complaint of noncompliance: regulations
SUMMARY
This bill authorizes the Superintendent (SPI) to ensure appeals
regarding pupil fees are resolved in a timely manner and
prohibits a school from establishing a local policy that
authorizes resolution of a complaint by only providing a remedy
to the complainant without also providing a remedy to all
affected students, parents, and guardians.
BACKGROUND
Existing law establishes that state-supported educational
opportunities have a right to be enjoyed without regard to
economic status and prohibits school officials from requiring
any pupil, except for pupils in classes for adults, to purchase
any instructional material for the pupils' use in the school.
(Education Code § 51004 and § 60070)
Existing law specifies that a pupil enrolled in a school shall
not be required to pay a pupil fee, deposit or other charge
imposed for participation in any educational activity offered by
a school, school district, charter school, or county office of
education that constitutes an integral fundamental part of
elementary and secondary education including curricular and
extracurricular activities. (EC § 49011 and 49010)
Existing law provides that a complaint regarding pupil fees may
be filed with the principal of a school under the Uniform
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Complaint Procedures (UCP). The complaint may be filed
anonymously. If a public school finds merit in the complaint,
then the public school is required to provide a remedy to all
affected pupils, parents and guardians that, where applicable,
includes reasonable efforts to ensure full reimbursement. A
complainant who is dissatisfied with a local educational
agency's (LEA's) Decision may appeal the decision to the
California Department of Education (CDE). The complainant shall
receive a written appeal decision within 60 days of the CDE's
receipt of the appeal. (EC § 49013)
ANALYSIS
This bill:
1. Prohibits a school from establishing a local policy that
authorizes resolution of a complaint by only providing a
remedy to the complainant without also providing a remedy
to all affected students, parents, and guardians.
2. Delegates all power and authority necessary to the SPI to
ensure timely resolution of any compliant found to have
merit.
3. Requires the superintendent to adopt regulations by June
30, 2016 that include but are not limited to the following
provisions:
A. Upon finding merit in an appeal,
require the department to specify the remedy a school
must take to resolve the complaint.
B. Authorize the CDE, as appropriate, to
resolve an appeal based on newly presented evidence
without sending the case back to the school.
C. Require the school to provide evidence
to the CDE of the corrective action taken within 60
days of the decision.
D. If the school fails to provide
corrective action, require the appropriate school or
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district administrator as specified to appear before
the state board and explain the school's failure to
fulfill the requirement.
STAFF COMMENTS
1. Need for the bill. According to the author, despite
current law, some schools continue to charge unlawful
school fees, and the complaint process does not always
function in the manner intended. Subsequently, parents have
reported that schools continue to resolve complaints by
reimbursing only the family that filed the complaint and
have experienced long delays in the process due to appeals
going back and forth from the department and the school.
This bill seeks to strengthen the local pupil fee complaint
process and CDE's authority over appeals in order to
improve the process for parents while establishing clear
guidelines for schools.
2. What is a pupil fees complaint? According to CDE, an
unlawful pupil fees complaint is a written statement
alleging violation of a federal or state law or regulation
related to noncompliance with laws relating to pupil fees.
A complaint alleging a violation must be filed with the
school through uniform complaint procedures outlined in
regulations (CCR, Title 5, sections 4600-4687 and EC
sections 4910-49013).
A. These procedures include among other things:
(1) Upon filing the school has 60 days to
complete the investigation and prepare a final
report.
(2) If there is disagreement with the
school's decision, the complainant can submit an
appeal to CDE within 15 days of receiving the
final decision.
(3) If CDE finds merit in the complaint,
the school is required to provide a remedy to all
affected students, parents, and guardians where
applicable.
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This bill statutorily clarifies the specific procedure
which must be followed by a school district in order to
remedy a complaint. It also clearly delegates power and
authority to the SPI to ensure timely resolution of any
complaints found by the SPI to have merit.
3. Appearing before the State Board of Education (SBE). SBE
is the K-12 policy-making body for academic standards,
curriculum, instructional materials, assessments and
accountability. The SBE adopts instructional materials for
use in grades K-8. The SBE also adopts regulations (Title
5) to implement a wide variety of programs created by the
Legislature, such as charter schools, and special
education. In addition, the SBE has the authority to grant
local education agency requests for waivers of certain
provisions of the state Education Code.
This bill would require the superintendent of the school
district or the county office of education or the principal of
the charter school to appear at the next regularly scheduled
meeting of the state board to explain why the school failed to
take corrective action and meet timeline requirements. It's
unclear if the board possesses the enforcement authority to
address a school's failure to comply with state law or if
appearing before the state board would motivate a resolution for
the complainant.
A more effective approach could be to require the school
district to notify all parents of the department's ruling on an
appeal and the requirement to remedy the issue.
In addition, the committee may wish to direct school districts
and school boards to offer a more effective enforcement
mechanism should a school fail to comply with existing law.
4. Related and prior legislation.
AB 1575 (Lara, CH. 776, 2012) required the CDE to publish
guidelines on pupil fees, incorporate pupil fees into the
uniform complaint process so students and parents can
challenge unlawful fees at their local school, and enable
parents to appeal a decision through the CDE's uniform
complaint process. AB 1575 was introduced in response to a
2001 report from the University of California Los Angeles
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that found multiple instances where schools charged
students and families for instructional materials despite
existing law.
AB 165 (Lara, 2011) would have reinforce the constitutional
prohibition on the imposition of pupil fees and establishes
policies to ensure compliance with the prohibition. AB 165
was ultimately vetoed by the Governor, whose message read:
This bill responds to a lawsuit filed by the ACLU
against the state, alleging that some local school
districts are denying students their right to a free
public education by charging improper fees for classes
and extracurricular activities. Local district
compliance with this right is essential, and those who
fail should be held accountable. But this bill takes
the wrong approach to getting there.
This bill would mandate that every single classroom in
California post a detailed notice and that all 1,045
school districts and over 1,200 charter schools follow
specific compliant, hearing and audit procedures, even
where there have been no complaints, let alone
evidence of any violation. This goes too far.
SUPPORT
ACLU
California Association for Bilingual Education
Californians Together
CTA
OPPOSITION
None received.
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