BILL ANALYSIS �
AB 224
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Date of Hearing: March 30, 2011
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION
Julia Brownley, Chair
AB 224 (Bonilla) - As Introduced: February 2, 2011
SUBJECT : School accountability: Academic Performance Index
SUMMARY : Requires the Superintendent of Public Instruction
(SPI), in consultation with the State Board of Education (SBE),
to incorporate both previously specified and additional measures
of performance into the Academic Performance Index (API), using
the best available data and commencing in fiscal year (FY)
2012-13. Specifically, this bill :
1)Deletes the requirement that attendance rates be incorporated
into the API.
2)Requires the SPI, in consultation with the SBE, to incorporate
into the API by FY 2012-13, for schools with any of grades 8
through 12, each of the following indicators using the best
available data; also requires the SPI to derive these measures
as specified.
a) High school graduation rates as defined in current law.
b) The rates at which pupils complete a course of study
that fulfills University of California and California State
University admission requirements.
c) The rates at which pupils complete a course of study
that provides the skills and knowledge necessary to attain
entry-level employment upon graduation from high school.
3)Requires that the weighting of components of the API shall be:
a) Until July 1, 2013 - at least 60% on the results of the
achievement tests specified.
b) Between July 1, 2013 and June 30, 2016 - at least 50% on
the results of the achievement tests specified.
c) On or before June 30, 2016 - 50% on the results of the
achievement tests specified in current law, and 50% on the
elements listed in 2) above; in addition, requires that
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each of the elements in 2) above receive equal weight,
while the rate at which pupils meet both elements in 2) b)
and 2) c) is required to be given additional weight.
4)Authorizes the SPI to convene an advisory committee to provide
recommendations for the implementation of these provisions,
and to develop recommendations for the inclusion of multiple
measures in the API of middle and junior high schools.
EXISTING LAW requires:
1)The SPI to develop the API to measure the performance of
schools, and to include a variety of indicators in that
measure, including, but not limited to, achievement test
results, attendance rates, and graduation rates.
2)School districts to offer to all otherwise qualified pupils in
seventh through twelfth grades both of the following:
a) A course of study fulfilling the requirements and
prerequisites for admission to California's public
institutions of postsecondary education.
b) A course of study that provides an opportunity to attain
entry-level employment skills in business or industry upon
graduation from high school.
FISCAL EFFECT : According to the Senate Appropriations
Committee analysis of a substantially similar bill in 2007:
1)Costs for the California Department of Education (CDE) related
to developing new indicators, facilitating the advisory
committee and subcommittee meetings, and providing for the
attendance of appropriate experts at these meetings.
2)Additional costs related to the collection and incorporation
of college preparation and career technical education
coursework data.
3)Significant costs, unknown but potentially in the millions,
for districts to compile this information and report it to the
CDE, to the extent that local education agencies do not
already collect this data.
COMMENTS : The SPI established, pursuant to SB 1 X1 (Alpert),
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Chapter 3, Statutes of 1999-2000 First Extraordinary Session, an
advisory committee to advise the SPI and the SBE on all
appropriate matters relative to the creation of the API. SB 1
X1 also requires the SPI, with the approval of the SBE, to
develop the API to measure the performance of schools, and to
include a variety of indicators in that measure, including, but
not limited to, achievement test results, attendance rates, and
graduation rates. Currently only achievement test results are
incorporated into the API, and the API is configured to produce
scores measuring a school's static performance at each grade
level, in each content area, in each year, at one point in time.
Having an API that focuses solely on achievement test results
may be too narrow in that it does not reflect information about
other student outcomes (e.g., dropout and graduation rates,
college readiness, preparation for the workplace) that are
important as measures of the performance of districts, schools
and subgroups. In addition, focusing solely on test scores may
actually lead to conclusions that are incorrect; as a perverse
example, a school that sees an increase in the number of
students dropping out could easily see a resulting increase in
test scores, and thus in the API for that school or district (if
the students dropping out tended to have below average test
scores), yet most would agree that this increase in test scores
and API are not reflective of an improvement in performance or
the quality of education in that school or district. The
solution to this problem would be to broaden the set of measures
that are composited to form the API. The Legislature foresaw
this when it initially authorized the development of the API to
be an index (i.e., a composite number reflecting a number of
component measures) based on data from multiple measures,
including achievement test results, attendance rates, and
graduation rates.
According to the author, "The purpose of this bill is to expand
and incorporate multiple measures into the API to allow for
accurate measuring of school district and student academic
performance. We must move away from focusing exclusively on
standardized test results and high school exit exams, which do
not reveal information about student outcomes such as
dropout/graduation rates or college/workforce readiness."
Opponents of a substantially similar bill in 2007 argued that
including data on dropouts and availability of course offerings
that fulfill admission requirements to California's public
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universities would skew the emphasis of the API toward high
schools, resulting in the focusing of more resources at that
level to the detriment of elementary and middle schools.
However, since the Legislature can target the use of resources
by grade span as well as by API ranking, this effect, to the
extent that it would exist, could be easily moderated.
Though inclusion of graduation rates in the API is current law,
authority was provided to the SPI to determine when data on
graduation rates would be included in the API; at this point in
time, test scores remain as the only data on which the API is
based. Opponents of past proposals similar to this bill have
argued that data on graduation rates are not robust enough for
this type of use, and that it is unclear how the state would
collect data on courses of study fulfilling university admission
requirements or data showing how well schools and districts
prepare students for the workplace. In fact, this bill, by
requiring the inclusion of graduation rates by 2012-13, only
makes the inclusion of a currently required component of the API
time certain. In addition, information on student course-taking
that fulfills university admission requirements is already
measured and reported annually on the School Accountability
Report Card that is constitutionally required of every school
and district in the state. The bill also provides detailed
direction on the measurement of the extent to which schools
offer a course of study that provides the skills and knowledge
necessary to attain entry-level employment.
The author concludes that, "There is much more that we value
from our public school system than simply test scores. Student
outcomes are just as important as test scores and our
accountability system must measure and reflect that."
This bill also proposes to delete the current requirement that
attendance rates for pupils in elementary schools, middle
schools and secondary schools be included in the API. All other
data elements currently included in the API, as well as those
proposed by this bill, focus on student, school and district
outcomes; attendance rates are not a measure of achievement or
outcome, instead they are more a measure of input into the
education process and thus are different from other measures
included in the API. Deletion of attendance rates, as proposed,
would clearly define the API to be a measure of educational
outcomes.
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Committee amendments: Committee staff recommends the following
amendments:
1)Clarify that only test scores of pupils counted as enrolled in
the California Basic Education Data System (CBEDS), California
Longitudinal Pupil Achievement Data System (CALPADS), or any
successor data system be included in the API; CBEDS data
collections have been transitioned to CALPADS, and additional
data system upgrades could occur in the future.
2)Delete the requirement that the SPI determine the extent to
which data are reported to the state and are accurate before
including high school graduation rates in the API. This
deletion is necessary to reconcile this current requirement
with the proposal in the bill that requires graduation rates
to be included in the API commencing with the 2012-13 fiscal
year.
3)Clarify that the high school exit examination referred to is
the examination developed pursuant to Section 60850 of the
Education Code.
4)Reconcile a conflict in and clarify the implementation dates
proposed in this bill.
5)Charge the existing advisory committee, established to advise
the SPI and the SBE on all appropriate matters relative to the
creation of the API, rather than a new advisory committee,
with developing recommendations for the inclusion of multiple
measures in the API of middle and Junior high schools as
proposed in this bill.
Previous legislation: AB 400, vetoed in 2007, was substantially
similar to this bill. AB 519 (Mendoza), held in the Senate
Appropriations Committee in 2007 but later amended to a
different subject, would have required the incorporation into
the API of data regarding the availability in high schools of a
course of study that fulfills University of California and
California State University admission requirements, and the
submission of a plan for incorporating dropout data into the
API. AB 2167 (Arambula), Chapter 743, Statutes of 2006,
establishes a specific methodology for including graduation
rates, as previously required, in the API; also requires the SPI
to report annually to the Legislature on graduation and dropout
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rates in the state. SB 1284 (Scott), held in the Assembly
Appropriations Committee in 2006, would have updated and made
technical amendments to statutes that establish the API. SB 257
(Alpert), Chapter 782, Statutes of 2003, requires the advisory
committee established to advise the SPI on the API to make
recommendations to the SPI on a methodology for generating a
"gain" score measurement to provide more accurate measure of a
school's growth over time. AB 1295 (Thomson), Chapter 887,
Statutes of 2001, makes changes to the API to allow small school
districts to receive an API score, receive growth targets, and
performance awards. SB 1 X1 (Alpert), Chapter 3, Statutes of
1999-2000 First Extraordinary Session, known as the Public
Schools Accountability Act (PSAA), authorizes the state's
current accountability program, including establishment of the
PSAA Advisory Committee and development of the API.
REGISTERED SUPPORT / OPPOSITION :
Support
California Agricultural Teachers' Association
California Association of Leaders for Career Preparation
California Business Education Association
California Manufacturers and Technology Association
Opposition
School for Integrated Academics and Technologies (SIATech)
(Unless amended)
Analysis Prepared by : Gerald Shelton / ED. / (916) 319-2087