BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SENATE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
Senator Ricardo Lara, Chair
2015 - 2016 Regular Session
SB 499 (Liu) - Teachers: best practices teacher evaluation
system: school administrator evaluation.
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|Version: April 30, 2015 |Policy Vote: ED. 7 - 2 |
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|Urgency: No |Mandate: Yes |
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|Hearing Date: May 18, 2015 |Consultant: Jillian Kissee |
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This bill meets the criteria for referral to the Suspense File.
Bill Summary: This bill repeals and replaces various provisions
of existing law governing the evaluation of certificated
employees and beginning July 1, 2018, requires school districts
to implement a best practices teacher evaluation system, as
specified. This bill also repeals and replaces provisions of
existing law regarding school administrator evaluations.
Fiscal Summary:
This bill creates unknown, but significant, costs for a
new reimbursable state mandate likely to be in the tens of
millions annually. Those costs will be partially offset by
repealing law related to an existing mandate.
Cost pressure: Non-regulatory guidance - CDE estimates
to be $538,000 General Fund over a 2 year period.
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Background:
Stull Act
Under existing law, the Stull Act expresses legislative intent
that school districts and county governing boards establish a
uniform system of evaluation and assessment of certificated
personnel. With the exception of certificated personnel who are
employed on an hourly basis to teach adult education classes,
the Stull Act requires school districts to evaluate and assess
teacher performance as it reasonably relates to: the progress of
pupils toward district-adopted and, if applicable, state-adopted
academic content standards as measured by state-adopted
criterion referenced tests; instructional techniques and
strategies used by the employee; the employee's adherence to
curricular objectives; and the establishment and maintenance of
a suitable learning environment within the scope of the
employee's responsibilities. (Education Code § 44660, et. seq.)
Existing law requires an evaluation and assessment of the
performance of each certificated employee to be made at least
once each school year for probationary personnel, at least every
other year for personnel with permanent status, and at least
every five years for permanent employees who have been employed
with the district at least 10 years and were rated as meeting or
exceeding standards in their previous evaluation. Teachers who
receive an unsatisfactory rating may be required to participate
in a program designed to improve the employee's performance and
to further pupil achievement and the instructional objectives of
the district. However, if the district participates in the
California Peer Assistance and Review program, then the teachers
who receive an unsatisfactory rating are required to participate
in that program. (Education Code § 44664)
Existing law establishes the PAR program for teachers by
authorizing school districts and the exclusive representative of
the certificated employees to develop and implement the program
locally. The PAR programs are to include multiple observations
of a teacher during periods of classroom instruction and
sufficient staff development activities to assist a teacher in
improving his or her skills and knowledge. The final evaluation
of a teacher's participation in the program is made available
for placement in his or her personnel file. (Education Code §
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44505)
Proposed Law: This bill recasts various provisions of the law
governing the evaluation of certificated employees.
Specifically this bill:
1. Makes inoperative as of July 1, 2018, and repeals as of
January 1, 2019, the following Stull Act requirements:
A. Legislative intent that governing boards
establish a uniform system for evaluation and
assessment.
B. That a governing board, in developing and
adopting guidelines, avail itself of the advice of the
certificated instructional personnel in the district
as part of a locally negotiated collective bargaining
agreement.
C. The authorization that a school district may
include objective standards from the National Board of
Professional Teaching Standards or the California
Standards for the Teaching Profession in its
evaluation and assessment guidelines.
D. That each school district evaluate and assess
certificated employee performance as it reasonably
relates to the progress of students on the standards
they are required to establish on student achievement
at each grade level and subject area.
2. Adds the Evaluation and Assessment of Performance of
Certificated Employees and the Principal Evaluation System
as established in this bill to the existing list of
requirements that a governing board of a school district or
a county board of education may not request the State Board
of Education (SBE) to waive.
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Operative July 1, 2018, this bill:
3. Provides legislative intent that the primary purpose of
an evaluation system is to ensure that teachers meet the
highest professional standards of effective teaching,
thereby resulting in high levels of student learning. It
also declares that the attributes of the best practices
teacher evaluation system established in this bill are
based on the California Standards for the Teaching
Profession adopted by the Commission on Teacher
Credentialing (CTC) in October 2009, and the system of
evaluation for school administrators is based on the
California Professional Standards for Educational Leaders
adopted by the CTC in February 2014.
4. Expands the requirement to establish standards of
expected student achievement at each grade level that it
serves in each area of study to each county board of
education, in addition to each school district.
5. Requires the governing board of each school district and
each county office of education to adopt and implement a
best practices teacher evaluation as set forth in this
bill. Requires this evaluation system to be locally
negotiated pursuant to the Educational Employment Relations
Act; and specifies that if the certificated employees do
not have an exclusive bargaining representative, the
governing board of the school district or the county board
of education must adopt objective evaluation and support
components, as applicable, that are consistent with
provisions in this bill.
6. Requires a best practices teacher evaluation system to
include the following attributes:
A. An evaluation of each teacher based on the degree to
which he or she accomplishes the following objectives:
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1) Engages and supports students in learning;
2) Creates and maintains an effective environment
for student learning to the extent it is within the
teacher's control;
3) Understands and organizes subject matter for
student learning;
4) Plans instruction and designs learning
experiences for all students;
5) Uses student assessment information to inform
instruction and improve learning, evidence of which
must include, the use of formative and summative
assessments, and for those who instruct English
learner students, the English language development
test;
6) Develops as a professional educator; and
7) Contributes to student academic growth based
on multiple measures including state and local
formative and summative assessments and the degree to
which students acquire the English Language
Development standards, as applicable.
B. Multiple observations of instructional and other
professional practices that are conducted by evaluators
who have been appropriately trained and calibrated to
ensure consistency and who have demonstrated competence
in teacher evaluation, as determined by the school
district. Observations must be conducted using a uniform
evaluation tool that is appropriate to the teacher's
assignment.
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1) Specifies that before each formal observation,
the observer must meet with the teacher to discuss the
purpose of the observation and meet again after the
observation to discuss recommendations, as necessary.
C. A minimum of three performance levels.
1. Repeals and replaces the requirement that school
district governing boards, and adds county boards of
education, establish and define job responsibilities for
certificated non-instructional personnel, including but not
limited to, supervisory and administrative personnel, whose
responsibilities cannot be evaluated appropriately under
the best practices teacher evaluation system; maintains the
current requirement that school districts, and adds county
board of education, evaluate and assess the performance of
non-instructional certificated employees as it reasonably
relates to the fulfillment of those responsibilities.
2. Specifies that where a locally negotiated evaluation
system is in effect, the evaluation system remains in
effect until the parties to the contract negotiate a
successor agreement. Provides that a memorandum of
understanding will not extend the adoption of a locally
negotiated teacher evaluation system that is in effect at
the time this requirement becomes operative.
3. Recasts requirements governing evaluation cycles for
certificated employees and unsatisfactory performance:
A. Maintains existing requirement that
probationary personnel be evaluated at least once each
school year and that personnel with permanent status
be evaluated at least every other year.
B. Changes the frequency of evaluations for
personnel with permanent status who have been employed
at least 10 years with a school district who are
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highly qualified and who were rated as meeting or
exceeding standards in the previous evaluation.
Specifically, this bill changes the frequency from at
least every five years to at least every three years.
Also, requires the evaluator to conduct at least one
unscheduled observation per year during a year when
the employee does not receive a formal performance
evaluation and assessment.
C. Maintains existing requirements for
evaluations:
1) Requires the evaluation to include
recommendations, if necessary, as to areas of
improvement.
2) Requires the employing authority to
notify an employee in writing if the employee is not
performing his or her duties in a satisfactory manner
and to describe the unsatisfactory performance.
Requires the employing authority to confer with the
employee making specific recommendations as to areas
of improvement.
3) Requires that if a permanent
certificated employee has received an unsatisfactory
evaluation, that the employing authority provide
professional development based on the specific
recommendations as to areas of improvement and to
annually evaluate the employee until the employee
achieves a positive evaluation or is separated from
the school district or county office of education.
4) Specifies an evaluation that contains
an unsatisfactory rating of a permanent certificated
employee's performance in the area of teaching
methods or instruction may include a requirement that
the certificated employee participate in a program
designed to improve appropriate areas of the
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employee's performance, as specified. For
probationary certificated employee's, the employing
authority may elect to offer such program. Requires
any certificated employee who receives an
unsatisfactory rating on an evaluation to participate
in the California Peer Assistance and Review Program
for Teachers if the district has such a program.
5) Maintains the existing requirement
that hourly and temporary hourly employees are
excluded by the provisions governing the teacher
evaluation system, and provides that substitute
teachers may be excluded at the discretion of the
governing board.
4. Repeals the existing provisions of law governing
administrator evaluations and requires the governing board
of each school district and county board of education to
establish a system of evaluation for school administrators
to guide their growth and performance. The system is
required to include the following attributes:
A. Promoting the success of all pupils by facilitating
the development and implementation of a vision of student
learning, as specified;
B. Advocating and supporting a safe, nurturing school
culture that sustains a quality instructional program
conducive to student learning and staff professional
growth, as specified.
C. Ensuring the management, organization, and operation
of a safe and successful learning environment, as
specified.
D. Collaborating with parents and the community to
establish an inclusive school environment, as specified.
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E. Providing ethical and professional leadership that
fosters effective instructional practice. Specifies that
school administrators are required to be held accountable
for the academic growth of students over time and
academic growth must be based on multiple measures,
including statewide student assessments, which may
include, among other things, student work as well as
school longitudinal data.
F. Providing professional leadership by understanding,
responding, and influencing the larger social, political,
cultural and legal context with the goal of ensuring
student success.
1. Requires the governing board of the school district and
the county board of education to identify who will conduct
the evaluation of each school administrator. Requires a
school administrator to be evaluated annually for the first
and second year of employment as a new administrator and
the school district or county board of education may
determine the frequency at regular intervals of evaluation
after this period.
2. Requires evaluators and administrators to review school
success and progress throughout the year, which includes
goals that are defined by the school district or the county
offices of education, including those approved in the
school district and the county board of education local
control and accountability plan.
3. Includes both the best practices teacher evaluation
system and the school administrator evaluation in the
mandate block grant in the event that the Commission on
State Mandates determines them to contain costs mandated by
the state.
This bill requires, by May 1, 2016, or May 1 of the year that
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precedes the year in which an existing collective bargaining
contract will expire, whichever is later, the governing board of
each school district and each county office of education to
disclose the provisions of the evaluation system seek comment on
the development and implementation of best practices teacher
evaluation system. It requires the governing board of each
school district and county board of education to seek public
comment both during local negotiations and before the final
agreement of local negotiations. It also requires that these
requirements apply to the school administrator evaluation
program.
This bill authorizes the SBE, in consultation with the
Superintendent and stakeholders, to adopt non-regulatory
guidance to support the implementation of the best practices
teacher evaluation system by school districts and county offices
of education that may include various model evaluation systems
and processes.
Finally, this bill includes legislative intent to provide
adequate resources to train evaluators, continue robust
beginning teacher induction programs, and support struggling
educators.
Prior Legislation: AB 575 (O'Donnell & Atkins), AB 1495
(Weber), and AB 1078 (Olsen) would all make changes to the
certificated employee evaluation system. AB 575 is pending in
the Assembly Appropriations Committee and AB 1495 and AB 1078
are pending before the Assembly Education Committee.
AB 5 (Fuentes, 2012), similar to this bill, would have repealed
and replaced various provisions of existing law governing the
evaluation of certificated employees and required school
districts to implement a best practices teacher evaluation
system.
Staff Comments: The Stull Act, in existing law, expresses
legislative intent that governing boards establish a uniform
system of evaluation and assessment of certificated personnel
within each school district, and requires school districts to
evaluate and assess teacher performance, as specified. The
state has reimbursed school districts approximately $18 million
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in annual mandate costs related to implementing the
requirements. The Stull Act was included in the K-12 mandates
block grant created in the 2012-13 Budget Act. Instead of
submitting detailed claims on an ongoing basis, listing how much
time and money was spent on each mandated activity, local
educational agencies can choose to receive funding for all
mandated activities included in the block grants. For those
that participate, local educational agencies receive block grant
funding on a per-student basis based on average daily attendance
in which rates vary depending on grade span and type of local
educational agency. This bill will create pressure to increase
the mandate block grant to reflect this new mandate.
This bill repeals and replaces various provisions of existing
law governing the evaluation of certificated employees and
school administrators and beginning July 1, 2018. Therefore
payments for the current Stull Act would likely be replaced for,
and would partially offset, payments towards the new, more
expansive, mandate required in this bill. The Commission on
State Mandates will ultimately determine which implementation
activities and expenses will be reimbursable. That
determination will likely include:
Evaluations : The development and implementation of a best
practices teacher evaluation and school administrator system for
school districts and county offices of education, including
seeking public comment at a regularly scheduled public hearing
would likely be reimbursable as well as the evaluation of each
teacher based on the degree to which the teacher accomplishes
enumerated objectives.
This bill specifies the frequency of evaluations requires them
to be conducted on a continuing basis. More specifically, this
bill: (1) increases rate at which permanent employees with 10
years of employment, as specified, will be evaluated (instead of
once every 5 years, this bill requires once every 3 years); (2)
requires additional evaluations until the permanent employee
achieves a positive evaluation; and (3) the additional
unscheduled observation per year during a year when the
certificated employee does not receive a formal performance
evaluation and assessment. Staff time for multiple classroom
observations, written evaluations, evaluation reviews, and
meetings with the teacher will all likely be reimbursable.
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Collective bargaining : This bill specifies necessary components
of a teacher evaluation system, and mandates that the details of
those components be collectively bargained at the local level.
Under this bill, approximately 1,000 school districts and 58
county offices of education are required to develop and
collectively bargain their teacher evaluation procedures.
Training : This bill requires classroom observations be conducted
by evaluators who have been "appropriately trained and
calibrated to ensure consistency and who have demonstrated
competence in teacher evaluation, as determined by the school
district." Training associated with this requirement would
likely be reimbursable and could be in the low tens of millions
of dollars.
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