BILL NUMBER: AB 1741 AMENDED
BILL TEXT
AMENDED IN ASSEMBLY APRIL 14, 2010
AMENDED IN ASSEMBLY MARCH 10, 2010
INTRODUCED BY Assembly Member Coto
FEBRUARY 8, 2010
An act to add Section 53204 to the Education Code, relating to
public schools.
LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST
AB 1741, as amended, Coto. Public schools: persistently
lowest-achieving schools.
The federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009
provides $4.3 billion for the State Incentive Grant Fund (Race to the
Top Fund), which is a competitive grant program designed to
encourage and reward states that are implementing specified
educational objectives. The United States Secretary of Education has
issued regulations and guidelines regarding state eligibility under
the Race to the Top program, including specified provisions relating
to turning around schools identified as persistently lowest-achieving
schools. Under those provisions, a local educational agency
governing a school identified as a persistently lowest-achieving
school is required to implement one of 4 interventions, as specified
under those federal regulations and guidelines. Under the restart
model, one of the specified interventions, a local educational agency
would convert a school or closes and reopens a school under a
charter school operator, a charter management organization, or an
education management organization.
This bill would require a local educational agency that
elects to convert a school or to close and reopen a school under a
charter school operator or a charter management organization to
select a charter school operator or management organization that
meets certain additional requirements relating to the needs of
English learners selects the restart model as an
intervention model to consider certain additional factors relating to
the needs of English learners when approving a petition for the
establishment of a charter school, and would also require a
chartering authority to consider those factors in determining whether
to grant the renewal of a charter granted in accordance with those
provisions .
Vote: majority. Appropriation: no. Fiscal committee: yes.
State-mandated local program: no.
THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA DO ENACT AS FOLLOWS:
SECTION 1. The Legislature finds and declares the following:
(a) Senate Bill 1, enacted as Chapter 2 of the Fifth Extraordinary
Session of the Statutes of 2010, requires the local educational
agency of a school identified as a persistently lowest-achieving
school to implement one of four intervention models specified under
federal provisions for purposes of implementing the federal Race to
the Top program. Pursuant to one of those intervention models, the
restart model, a local educational agency would convert a school or
closes and reopens a school under a charter school operator, a
charter management organization, or an education management
organization.
(b) The option of converting a school to a charter school can be
troubling to parents of and advocates for English learners. Little
data is maintained about the success of English learners in charter
schools, and English learners are conspicuously underrepresented in
the enrollment of many charter schools.
SEC. 2. Section 53204 is added to the Education Code, to read:
53204. A local educational agency that identifies a persistently
lowest-achieving school and chooses to implement a restart model, as
described in Appendix C of the Notice of Final Priorities,
Requirements, Definitions, Selection Criteria for the Race to the Top
program, published in the Federal Register, Volume 74 of Number 221,
November 18, 2009, by converting the school or closing and reopening
the school under a charter school operator or a charter management
organization, shall select a charter school operator or charter
management organization that demonstrates all of the following:
(a) In its program design, the charter school has programs and
core courses in place to meet the language and cultural needs of
English learners.
(b) The charter school has administrators and staff qualified to
teach English learners.
(c) The charter school has a relevant outreach program that
reaches parents and assists them in being involved in the school and
understanding how the charter school process works.
(d) Programs and staffing are designed to enable
non-English-speaking parents to participate fully as partners in
their children's education.
53204. (a) A petition for the establishment of a charter school
pursuant to paragraph (2) of subdivision (a) of Section 53202 shall,
in addition to meeting the requirements set forth in Section 47605,
include a reasonably comprehensive description of all of the
following:
(1) A description of the program design that will provide programs
and core courses to meet the academic, language, and cultural needs
of English learners at the school.
(2) The means by which administrators and staff qualified to teach
English learners will be hired at the school.
(3) The manner in which a relevant outreach program will be
implemented that reaches parents and assists them in being involved
in the school and understanding how the charter school process works.
(4) A description of the programs and staffing that will be
implemented and designed to enable non-English-speaking parents to
participate fully as partners in their children's education at the
school.
(5) If the petitioner currently operates other charter schools, a
description of the programs designed for English learners that the
petitioner has implemented at other schools it currently operates.
(b) A local educational agency that has one or more schools
identified as a persistently lowest-achieving school pursuant to
subdivision (b) of Section 53200, and selects the intervention model
in paragraph (2) of subdivision (a) of Section 53202, shall consider
all of the elements described in subdivision (a) in approving a
petition for the establishment of a charter school.
(c) In determining whether to grant a renewal of a charter granted
pursuant to paragraph (2) of subdivision (a) of Section 53202, a
chartering authority shall evaluate the renewal petition pursuant to
Sections 47605 and 47607 and shall also consider, as one factor, the
degree to which a charter school has implemented the programs
specified in paragraphs (1) to (4), inclusive, of subdivision (a).