BILL ANALYSIS
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|SENATE RULES COMMITTEE | AB 2402|
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THIRD READING
Bill No: AB 2402
Author: Block (D)
Amended: 6/17/10 in Senate
Vote: 21
SENATE EDUCATION COMMITTEE : 8-0, 6/30/10
AYES: Romero, Huff, Alquist, Emmerson, Hancock, Liu,
Price, Simitian
NO VOTE RECORDED: Wyland
SENATE APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE : 11-0, 8/12/10
AYES: Kehoe, Ashburn, Alquist, Corbett, Emmerson, Leno,
Price, Walters, Wolk, Wyland, Yee
ASSEMBLY FLOOR : 50-26, 6/2/10 - See last page for vote
SUBJECT : California State University: admissions
SOURCE : Author
DIGEST : This bill requires the Trustees of the
California State University to ensure that any changes in
the admission criteria for campus admission comply with
specified consultation, public meeting, notification and
disclosure requirements, and prohibits any change from
becoming effective until one year has elapsed, or six
months, if the change is based upon the resources of the
local service area of the affected campus.
ANALYSIS : Current law establishes the California State
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University (CSU) and creates a Board of Trustees
responsible for its administration. The Trustees are
designated the authority to adopt rules and regulations for
the government of the CSU. Current law requires specified
notice and hearing procedures prior to the adoption,
amendment or repeal of regulations.
This bill:
1.Requires, for purposes of ensuring public notice and
transparency that the CSU Trustees ensure that changes in
the criteria for admission to a university campus comply
with specified requirements. Specifically, prior to
adopting a change in criteria for admissions that affects
applicants residing within the local service area, a
campus must:
A. Consult with stakeholders (including the governing
boards of school districts, community college
districts, and community organizations) located
within the local service are in a public meeting.
B. Hold three public hearings in the campus' local
service area to solicit public comment on the
proposed changes.
C. Provide public notice, as specified, of the
proposed change on the campus' Web site and in three
newspapers of general circulation in the local
service area that includes a description of the
proposed change, the right of the public to comment,
and the date, time and locations of the meetings.
D. Publish all public comments and university
responses, as well as the university's final decision
on the Web site of the affected campus.
E. submit the proposed change to the Chancellor of
the CSU for approval who is required to decide and
report on the decision to the Trustees in writing at
their next regularly scheduled meeting.
F. Prohibits a change from becoming effective before
a year has elapsed after the change is approved,
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except that a change in the criteria based on
resources that affect applicants within the local
service area may become effective after six months
have elapsed since approval by the Chancellor.
2.Applies these requirements to all changes in the
admission criteria that affect eligibility of local
service area applicants, including change to transfer
requirements and determinations regarding impaction of
majors.
3.Defines "local service area" for purposes of the bill.
Comments
Local Admission Guarantee . This bill defers the definition
of "local service area" to CSU Coded Memorandum AA-2005-05
which delineates the geographic territory assigned to each
campus for purposes of providing local high schools and
community colleges information about the CSU and its
campuses and for campus impaction purposes.
Local first-time freshmen and upper-division transfer
students are defined as those students who graduate from a
high school district or community college district,
respectively, historically served by a CSU campus in that
region. Under the guarantee, CSU eligible local first-time
freshmen and upper-division transfer students are required
to be admitted to an impacted campus on the basis of
established CSU system admission policies. According to
the CSU, the local admission guarantee applies to impacted
campuses, but not to impacted majors and programs.
Impaction . An undergraduate major, program, or campus is
designated as impacted (subject to approval by the
Chancellor) when it receives more eligible applicants
during the initial filing period than it can accommodate
given its instructional resources and physical capacity.
Impaction may be defined by specific program or by the
entering class level (i.e., first-time freshmen or
upper-division transfers), or some combination of these.
Programs or campuses are then authorized to include
supplemental criteria (approved by the Chancellor) to
screen applicants within a specific enrollment category.
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Campuses that are impacted are authorized to implement
supplemental admission criteria for applicants who reside
outside the local area of the campus, but CSU eligible
local first-time freshmen and local upper-division transfer
students are required to be admitted to an impacted campus
on the basis of established CSU systemwide admission
policies. However, admission to a specific program cannot
be assured if the program is impacted.
According to CSU Enrollment and Management Policy and
Practices, consistent with the enrollment priorities
outlines in statute, California Community College transfer
students who have successfully concluded a course of study
in an approved transfer agreement program receive priority
over all other applicants to the CSU.
Current Status . The CSU reports that, of its 23 campuses,
12 are impacted at the upper-division transfer level, 13
are impacted for first-time freshmen, and two, Cal Poly San
Luis Obispo (SLO) and SDSU, are impacted in all majors. As
of 2008, all campuses, except SLO and SDSU indicate that
they accept all first-time freshmen applicants that
graduate from high schools in the local service area and
meet systemwide eligibility criteria.
SLO has reportedly been impacted for over 20 years. SDSU
was recently approved to declare impaction at each major by
the CSU. At SDSU, at the first-time freshmen level, 80
percent of the class is selected on the basis of an
eligibility index higher than that required for regular CSU
admission. The remaining 20 percent are selected on the
basis of local area entitlement, socioeconomic or education
factors, exceptional talents, or criteria.
Related Legislation
AB 2401 (Block), 2009-10 Session, requires the CSU to
provide applicants residing in the local service area
priority for admission to the applicant's local CSU campus
over other California residents or out-of-state applicants
entering as first-time freshmen or sophomores. (Held under
submission in Senate Education Committee)
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FISCAL EFFECT : Appropriation: No Fiscal Com.: Yes
Local: No
According to the Senate Appropriations Committee:
Fiscal Impact (in thousands)
Major Provisions 2010-11 2011-12
2012-13 Fund
Annual evaluation/ -- unknown, potentially over
$260 -- Federal
report
Admin expenses $50 $100
$100 Federal
SUPPORT : (Verified 8/16/10)
American Federation of State, County and Municipal
Employees, AFL-CIO
California State University
Community College League of California
Latino Concilio on Higher Education of San Diego County
We Advocate Gender Equity
ARGUMENTS IN SUPPORT : According to the author's office,
San Diego State University (SDSU) recently implemented
admission changes without notifying the surrounding
community that would have been affected. Because students
had planned their academic curriculum for the original
admission criteria, many students found themselves
unqualified for eligibility to enroll at SDSU, a goal they
had already spent years working towards.
This bill outlines the procedurally transparent steps which
must be taken before changes to admissions criteria that
affect applicants in a local service area are approved.
ASSEMBLY FLOOR :
AYES: Ammiano, Arambula, Bass, Beall, Block, Blumenfield,
Bradford, Brownley, Buchanan, Caballero, Charles
Calderon, Carter, Chesbro, Coto, Davis, De La Torre, De
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Leon, Eng, Evans, Feuer, Fong, Fuentes, Furutani,
Galgiani, Hall, Hayashi, Hernandez, Hill, Huber, Huffman,
Jones, Bonnie Lowenthal, Ma, Mendoza, Monning, Nava,
Norby, V. Manuel Perez, Portantino, Ruskin, Salas,
Saldana, Skinner, Solorio, Swanson, Torlakson, Torres,
Torrico, Yamada, John A. Perez
NOES: Adams, Anderson, Bill Berryhill, Blakeslee, Conway,
Cook, DeVore, Emmerson, Fletcher, Fuller, Gaines,
Garrick, Gilmore, Hagman, Harkey, Jeffries, Knight,
Logue, Miller, Nestande, Niello, Nielsen, Silva, Smyth,
Tran, Villines
NO VOTE RECORDED: Tom Berryhill, Lieu, Audra Strickland,
Vacancy
CPM:cm 8/16/10 Senate Floor Analyses
SUPPORT/OPPOSITION: SEE ABOVE
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