BILL ANALYSIS
------------------------------------------------------------
|SENATE RULES COMMITTEE | AB 1741|
|Office of Senate Floor Analyses | |
|1020 N Street, Suite 524 | |
|(916) 651-1520 Fax: (916) | |
|327-4478 | |
------------------------------------------------------------
THIRD READING
Bill No: AB 1741
Author: Coto (D)
Amended: 6/29/10 in Senate
Vote: 21
SENATE EDUCATION COMMITTEE : 5-0, 6/23/10
AYES: Romero, Alquist, Liu, Price, Simitian
NO VOTE RECORDED: Huff, Emmerson, Hancock, Wyland
ASSEMBLY FLOOR : 49-27, 5/13/10 - See last page for vote
SUBJECT : Charter schools
SOURCE : Californians Together
DIGEST : This bill authorizes a chartering authority to
deny a petition for the creation of a charter school if the
petition does not contain a comprehensive strategy that
provides for the academic, language, and cultural needs of
English learners (ELs), if at least 15 percent of the
charter school's students are expected to be ELs.
ANALYSIS : Existing law requires charter developers to
collect certain signatures in support of the petition and
requires petitions to include a prominent statement that a
signature means that the person signing has a meaningful
interest in teaching in or having his or her children
attend the school. Existing law authorizes a school
district, county office of education, or the State Board of
Education (SBE) to approve or deny a petition for a charter
CONTINUED
AB 1741
Page
2
school.
Existing law authorizes a charter to be granted for not
more than five years and requires charter schools to meet
specified criteria prior to receiving a charter renewal.
Existing law requires the renewal and any material revision
of the provisions of the charter to be made only with the
approval of the authority that granted the charter and be
based on the same standards as the original charter.
Existing law requires the Superintendent of Public
Instruction and SBE to establish a list of Persistently
Lowest Achieving Schools (PLAS) and requires the governing
board to implement for any school so identified one of four
school intervention models beginning in the 2010-11 school
year. The four models are:
Turnaround model in which the local education agency
(LEA) undertakes a series of major school improvement
actions including replacing the principal and rehiring no
more than half of the staff.
Restart model in which the LEA converts a school or
closes and reopens a school as a charter school.
School closure model in which the LEA closes a school and
enrolls students in another school.
Transformation model in which the LEA implements a series
of required school improvement strategies, including
replacing the principal and increasing instructional
time.
Existing law specifies that if 15 percent or more of the
pupils enrolled in a public school that provides
instruction in kindergarten or any of grades 1 to 12,
inclusive, speak a single primary language other than
English, as determined from the annual language census in
the preceding year, all notices, reports, statements, or
records sent to the parent or guardian of any such pupil by
the school or school district shall, in addition to being
written in English, be written in the primary language, and
may be responded to either in English or the primary
language.
AB 1741
Page
3
This bill allows the governing board of a school district
to deny a charter petition if the charter school is
expected to serve a student population that is at least 15
percent ELs and the petition does not contain details of
the following: (1) programs and courses that meet the
academic, language, and cultural needs of ELs, (2) hiring
of staff qualified to teach ELs, (3) parent outreach
program, and (4) programs and staffing designed to
accommodate and encourage participation of non-English
speaking
parents. The petition also will be required to detail any
EL programs the petitioner currently implements at other
charter schools.
FISCAL EFFECT : Appropriation: No Fiscal Com.: Yes
Local: Yes
SUPPORT : (Verified 8/3/10)
Californians Together (source)
California Council on Teacher Education
California Federation of Teachers
California Teachers Association
California Teachers of English to Speakers of Other
Languages
Los Angeles County Office of Education
Parent Institute for Quality Education
Public Advocates
San Francisco Unified School District
United Teachers Los Angeles
OPPOSITION : (Verified 8/3/10)
California Charter Schools Association
ARGUMENTS IN SUPPORT : According to the author's office,
the purpose of this bill is to ensure that charter schools
have the resources and capacity to provide appropriate and
quality education to ELs. As local education agencies move
to implement interventions for turning around low achieving
schools, the author contends that this measure will help
ensure that a PLAS converting to a charter school is
positioned to address the needs of ELs who will be enrolled
AB 1741
Page
4
in the school.
ARGUMENTS IN OPPOSITION : Opponents argue that this bill
is not necessary because current law gives governing
boards' the responsibility and authority to deny petitions
that do not contain a comprehensive description of the
students the school will educate and the educational
programs to be provided to those students. Opponents also
point out that governing boards have the authority to
restructure or not to renew a school's charter if specific
groups within the charter school's student enrollment are
not performing, or there is evidence their needs are not
being addressed.
ASSEMBLY FLOOR :
AYES: Ammiano, Arambula, Bass, Beall, Block, Blumenfield,
Bradford, Brownley, Buchanan, Charles Calderon, Carter,
Chesbro, Coto, Davis, De La Torre, De Leon, Eng, Evans,
Feuer, Fong, Fuentes, Furutani, Galgiani, Hall, Hayashi,
Hernandez, Hill, Huber, Huffman, Jones, Lieu, Bonnie
Lowenthal, Ma, Mendoza, Monning, Nava, Nestande, V.
Manuel Perez, Portantino, Ruskin, Salas, Saldana,
Solorio, Swanson, Torlakson, Torres, Torrico, Yamada,
John A. Perez
NOES: Adams, Anderson, Bill Berryhill, Tom Berryhill,
Blakeslee, Conway, Cook, DeVore, Emmerson, Fletcher,
Fuller, Gaines, Garrick, Gilmore, Harkey, Jeffries,
Knight, Logue, Miller, Niello, Nielsen, Norby, Silva,
Smyth, Audra Strickland, Tran, Villines
NO VOTE RECORDED: Caballero, Hagman, Skinner, Vacancy
PQ:mw 8/3/10 Senate Floor Analyses
SUPPORT/OPPOSITION: SEE ABOVE
**** END ****