BILL ANALYSIS
Senate Appropriations Committee Fiscal Summary
Senator Christine Kehoe, Chair
2027 (Blumenfield)
Hearing Date: 08/02/2010 Amended: 07/15/2010
Consultant: Dan Troy Policy Vote: ED 8-0
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BILL SUMMARY: AB 2027 would authorize, commencing in the
2012-13 fiscal year, local education agencies to claim
attendance counting toward average daily attendance (ADA) for
apportionment purposes through online synchronous and
asynchronous instruction, as specified.
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Fiscal Impact (in thousands)
Major Provisions 2010-11 2011-12 2012-13 Fund
Regulations $125 General
Increased HS ADA $7,000 General*
Loss of savings $10,000 General*
IT equipment (pressure) $800 General*
*Counts toward meeting the Proposition 98 minimum funding
guarantee
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STAFF COMMENTS: This bill meets the criteria for referral to the
Suspense File.
Current law provide two methods of attendance accounting for the
claiming of ADA for apportionment purposes: 1) Classroom
Instruction - The pupil is engaged in educational activities
under the "immediate supervision and control" of a certificated
employee of the district and is scheduled to be enrolled in a
specified minimum number of minutes for a school day, and
attends school at least some part of that day, among other
requirements. 2) Independent Study - The assessed "time value"
of student work products performed outside of the classroom, but
under the general supervision of a certificated employee, as
specified.
Currently, to the extent local education agencies (LEAs) offer
online instruction, they must claim attendance through the rules
of independent study. This bill would create an additional
attendance accounting method for synchronous and asynchronous
online instruction, commencing with the 2012-13 fiscal year.
The bill defines a "synchronous" online course as a course where
the teacher and pupil are online at the same time and are able
to interact at that time. An "asynchronous" online course is
defined as a course where the teacher and pupil may be online at
different times and are unable to interact simultaneously.
In order for LEAs to claim ADA through online courses, the bill
would require that:
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AB 2027 (Blumenfield)
Attendance is claimed only for pupils enrolled in
grades 9-12.
The pupil is enrolled in classes that include online
courses or classroom courses, or both.
The pupil meets applicable instructional time
requirements.
Each online course is a "high-quality" course.
The bill defines high-quality online courses as those that are
approved by the LEA governing board and certified to meet
specified conditions, such as:
For purposes of providing immediate supervision and
verifying attendance for synchronous online instruction,
that the teacher is online at the same time as the pupil
and is able to make a line-of-sight visual connection
with each pupils.
For purposes of verifying asynchronous online
instruction, the teacher must be able to employ at least
two of the following: 1) Periodic proctored examinations,
2) Direct teacher-pupil meetings no less than twice per
calendar month, or 3) A line-of-sight visual connection
including but not limited to, Internet Webcam.
The bill makes provisions concerning required teacher-pupil
ratios and the quality of the online course teacher, requires
the administration of examinations by proctor or through other
reliable methods, and allows LEAs to contract with other LEAs to
provide the online instruction, as specified. The bill would
require that pupil participation is voluntary and that a pupil
cannot be denied course access due to the pupil's lack of
hardware or software necessary to participate in the course.
The SPI, in consultation with the Director of Finance and the
Controller, would be required to make revisions to any
attendance accounting manual or guidance to LEAs necessary to
clarify attendance accounting procedures for asynchronous online
courses. The bill would require the SPI, in consultation with
the Department of Finance, to adopt rules and regulations for
the purpose of clarifying or expanding the procedures required
for verifying the identification of pupils participating in
asynchronous online courses, and for including pupil attendance
in asynchronous online courses in the calculation of ADA.
The bill would become inoperative on July 1, 2016.
Immediate supervision is the foundation of the K-12 revenue
limit system. Removing that foundation through asynchronous
online learning may impair the state's ability to ensure that
its investment is spent directly on instruction. In only
limited circumstances (independent study) are school districts
funded for instruction that occurs without a pupil being under
the direct control of certificated staff, and such instruction
is subject to many regulations and restrictions to ensure the
rigor of the academic work and to ensure the state continues to
pay for time on task, albeit through a different accounting
method. Essentially, the state pays for time on task, and
asynchronous online instruction severs that link. Indeed, it is
possible that asynchronous online instruction would effectively
replace independent study, as the provisions are easier to meet.
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AB 2027 (Blumenfield)
The Legislature's unease with the independent study model was
evidenced by the passage of Chapter 892/2001 (SB 740, O'Connell)
which limited funding for charter schools that are primarily
non-classroom based. The Legislature was concerned that these
schools were receiving funds in excess of what was required to
fund non-classroom based instruction, and that it was not clear
to what extent and intensity instruction was being delivered to
pupils.
The Legislature has also demonstrated a hesitancy with online
instruction. AB 885 (Daucher), Chapter 801, Statutes of 2002,
authorized participation by high school students in an online
classroom program using an asynchronous, interactive curriculum
as immediate supervision in order to count this participation as
instructional time for the purpose of generating average daily
attendance (ADA) and associated funding. AB 294 (Daucher),
Chapter 429, Statutes of 2003, recast this program as a pilot,
added specified fiscal, record-keeping, and reporting
requirements and implemented other clean-up provisions as
requested in the Governor's AB 885 signing message. While the
program required some reporting, the scope of the evaluation was
not rigorous enough to inform the Legislature of the merits of
continuing the pilot or expanding online instruction to
statewide use. Unease with online instruction was demonstrated
by the failure of several bills since that time that would have
either reauthorized or reenacted the online pilot or otherwise
relaxed attendance accounting standards to allow for online
instruction on a broader basis.
This bill would entail costs of approximately $125,000 for the
Department of Education to develop new guidelines and
regulations. The Department of Education also estimates new
apportionment costs of approximately $7 million assuming that
1,000 pupils that would otherwise not be linked to the K-12
system engage in asynchronous high school "dropout recovery"
programs. More difficult to estimate would be the lost savings
to the state as districts will likely be able to claim higher
attendance rates under an asynchronous online attendance system
than under the current system. Even a one percent increase in
claimed attendance among the state's high school pupils would
lead to approximately $10 million in annual costs. The bill may
also result in some cost pressure for LEAs to purchase and
maintain the hardware and software necessary to implement the
program. The Department estimates these costs at $800,000.
Staff notes that the bill appears to specify a "teacher to
pupil" ratio in several places where a "pupil to teacher" ratio
is more likely intended. Further, if it is the will of the
committee to approve this bill, it should include a rigorous
evaluation to better inform policy makers of the merits of both
synchronous and asynchronous online instruction.