BILL ANALYSIS
Senate Appropriations Committee Fiscal Summary
Senator Christine Kehoe, Chair
429 (Brownley)
Hearing Date: 08/27/2009 Amended: 07/24/2009
Consultant: Dan Troy Policy Vote: ED 8-0
_________________________________________________________________
____
BILL SUMMARY: AB 429 would require an advisory committee to
make recommendations to the Superintendent of Public
Instruction, by July 1, 2011, for development of a
longitudinally valid assessment system in which annual academic
growth can be measured for both a school and a pupil over time.
_________________________________________________________________
____
Fiscal Impact (in thousands)
Major Provisions 2009-10 2010-11 2011-12 Fund
Longitudinal assessment $280 to $300, one time;
potential cost General
pressures in the millions to
implement
the committee's
recommendations
_________________________________________________________________
____
STAFF COMMENTS: SUSPENSE FILE. AS PROPOSED TO BE AMENDED.
Current law requires the Superintendent of Public Instruction
(SPI) to establish a committee to advise the SPI and the State
Board of Education (SBE) on the creation of the Academic
Performance Index (API) and make recommendations on the
feasibility of measuring academic performance utilizing unique
pupil identifiers. Current law also requires the SPI, with the
approval of the SBE, to develop and implement the API to measure
the performance of schools, and to include a variety of
indicators, including achievement test results, attendance
rates, and graduation rates in that measure, and requires the
SPI to establish an advisory committee to provide advice on all
appropriate matters relative to the creation of the API.
The API is designed to produce scores measuring a school's
performance at each grade level and content area at one point in
time. While the Department of Education calculates a measure
that compares this performance from one year to the next, this
"growth API" does not measure growth for a specific group of
students and is not based on information for individual pupils.
Given that, the measure may only be reflecting the differences
in two cohorts of pupils, say, last year's third grade class vs.
this year's third grade class. The current state testing system
does not measure the actual growth for the same students over
time.
Federal law (NCLB) requires states to measure student
proficiency in grades 3 through 8 and in specific subjects in
high school. The NCLB accountability measure calls for
increasing percentages of pupils to achieve specified levels of
proficiency over time with the goal of having all pupils deemed
"proficient" by 2013. By contrast, the state's accountability
measures call for schools to improve each year in relation to
that school's performance in the prior year. The two different
systems result in schools judged to be failing under the federal
system, while perhaps succeeding on the state index.
Page 2
AB 429 (Brownley)
California and other states have requested federal waivers to
allow the use of a system that rewards growth, rather than
requiring all pupils to meet set levels of performance. The
federal government rejected California's request because
California will not have an operational longitudinal database in
place until the California Longitudinal Pupil Achievement Data
System (CALPADS) is implemented in 2010. Also, the state
assessment system does not produce pupil scores that can be
compared from year to year, as described earlier.
There are many other approaches and methodologies that could be
employed to allow comparisons over time. The trade-off among
these procedures is generally between the increased validity and
accuracy of the results, and the cost and time involved in
implementing that approach. A "vertical scaling" process would
allow a student's growth to be tracked as the student moves up
the score scale that runs from the lowest grade level up through
the highest scores at the highest grade level and which would
reflect a progression through the content. Vertical scaling
would eliminate most of the problems associated with using the
API to compare school and district performance across time.
Other possible approaches rely on statistical procedures to
estimate what score, on the average, should be achieved in a
given year based on the previous year's score or other
information. In this way a student's or a school's actual score
can be compared to the projected score, and a judgment could be
made about whether the student or school grew at a greater or
lesser rate than average. A vertical scaling process would be
the most costly and comprehensive of the approaches, while
direct statistical methods would be relatively cheap and quick,
though would have more validity concerns.
The 2007 Budget Act required a study of academic growth measures
to evaluate multiple approaches for measuring individual pupil
annual growth on the state standards. The study examined
several approaches to measuring growth, including vertical
scaling and different statistical mediations. The study
recommended that the state proceed with a regression based
approach, consider the development of vertical scales, and not
pursue certain specific statistical approaches.
This bill directs the advisory committee to make recommendations
on the best course for the state to proceed toward a
longitudinally valid system for pupils and schools. No
implementation of proposed changes would occur unless funds were
specifically appropriated toward that purpose.
The Department of Education indicates costs of $280,000 to
$300,000 to complete to fully analyze the issues and make
recommendations. Depending on the outcome, there could be
significant costs pressures to implement the recommendations.
If the committee recommended a revision of the content standards
to create a valid vertical scaling assessment system, costs
would likely be in the tens of millions. Other potential
recommendations could be far less costly. The bill provides that
the recommendations of the committee could not be implemented
unless funds are appropriated for the purpose.
AS PROPOSED TO BE AMENDED:
Page 3
AB 429 (Brownley)
Author's amendments would express Legislative intent (rather
than require) that the advisory committee make recommendations
for the development of valid growth measure.