BILL ANALYSIS
SB 651
Page A
Date of Hearing: August 19, 2009
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
Kevin De Leon, Chair
SB 651 (Romero) - As Amended: July 15, 2009
Policy Committee: Education
Vote:10-0
Urgency: No State Mandated Local Program:
No Reimbursable: No
SUMMARY
This bill requires the Superintendent of Public Instruction
(SPI) to submit the Annual Report on Dropouts in California (the
dropout report) to the governor, the Legislature, and the State
Board of Education (SBE) on or before August 1, 2011 and
annually thereafter. Specifically, this bill:
1)Requires the dropout report to be based on data produced by
the California Longitudinal Pupil Achievement Data System
(CALPADS) and include specified information related to the
number of dropouts calculated over periods of time and by
different grade spans (i.e., grades 7-12).
2)Requires the dropout report to include information related to
pupil promotion rates, alternative schools, graduation rates,
and completion of coursework (i.e., career technical education
and college-prep). This measure also requires the data to be
provided by subgroup (i.e., English learner, Latino, African
American, etc.) and type (i.e., state, county, school
district, and schoolsite).
3)Requires the SPI to make the report available on the State
Department of Education's (SDE) website.
4)Repeals the requirement for local education agencies (LEAs) to
receive a per pupil allocation, prior to the 2010-11 fiscal
year (FY), for the implementation of CALPADS before specified
data regarding pupil dropouts and alternative schools may be
included in the calculation of the Academic Performance Index
(API). This language was in SB 219 (Steinberg), Chapter 731,
Statutes of 2007.
SB 651
Page B
FISCAL EFFECT
1)GF administrative costs of approximately $150,000 to complete
the report, as specified.
2)Potential GF administrative costs, likely less than $150,000,
to the SDE to meet the data collection requirements and
modifications to the API set forth in SB 219 (Steinberg),
Chapter 731, Statutes of 2007 (see comment #3 below).
3)Potential GF/98 costs, likely less than $200,000, to school
districts to collect and report data pursuant to the
requirements of SB 219 (Steinberg), Chapter 731, Statutes of
2007 (see comment #3 below).
COMMENTS
1)Purpose . According to the California Dropout Research Project
(CDRP) March 2009 statistics, the statewide graduation rate is
71.5%, which falls between the two rates reported by the
SDE.<1> The graduation rate for Asians exceeds 90%, while
the graduation rate for Whites is 80%. Graduation rates for
African American and Hispanic students are at 60%.
According to the CDRP's report: The Economic Losses of High
School Dropouts in California (Belfield and Levin, August
2007), California experiences $46.4 billion in total economic
losses from each cohort of 120,000 20-year-olds who never
complete high school; this is the equivalent of 2.9% of the
Annual State Gross Product. The authors further state that the
average high school graduate earns $290,000 more over a
lifetime than a high school dropout, and pays $100,000 more in
federal, state, and local taxes. Likewise, more the two-thirds
of high school dropouts will use food stamps during their
working lifetime and a high school graduate is 68% less likely
to be on any welfare program.
According to the author, this bill "would make smarter use of
existing student data to shine a spotlight on one of our most
--------------------------
<1> In February 2009, the SDE reported a 9th grade to graduate
rate of 67.7% and a No Child Left Behind rate of 80.6%.
SB 651
Page C
pressing education and economic challenges [the high school
dropout crisis]."
2)The CALPADS , established by SB 1453 (Alpert), Chapter 1002,
Statutes of 2002, required the SDE to track student
achievement to comply with the federal No Child Left Behind
Act of 2001. A longitudinal database requires individual
student identifiers be given to each student enrolled in the
public K-12 system. In the 2004-05 fiscal year, school
districts were provided incentive funding to create these
identifiers and establish systems to maintain them. To date,
all students have been assigned individual student
identifiers. The system is expected to be fully implemented by
in 2009-10 school year.
3)SB 219 (Steinberg), Chapter 731, Statutes of 2007 requires the
API, beginning July 1, 2011, to include additional information
regarding test scores and other data of pupils who were
referred by the school or school district of residence to an
alternative education program (i.e., juvenile court,
continuation, or community day school ). Chapter 731
specified that these provisions are to be implemented only if
LEAs receive a per pupil allocation prior to the 2010-11 FY
for implementation of CALPADS.
This committee inserted the operative funding language
referenced above into the bill to control GF/98 costs
associated with implementation. This bill repeals this
language. While CALPADS will be fully operational in the
2009-10 school year, it is unclear as to the amount of costs
LEAs would incur to implement SB 219 requirements. The
committee may wish to consider whether or not, given the
state's current fiscal crisis, it is appropriate to require
the additional duties associated with SB 219.
4)Related legislation . AB 374 (Block), pending in the Senate
Appropriations Committee, requires the SPI to produce a notice
to pupils about the consequences of dropping out of school
before reaching 18 years of age or graduating from high
school.
Analysis Prepared by : Kimberly Rodriguez / APPR. / (916)
319-2081