BILL ANALYSIS �
AB 1741
Page 1
Date of Hearing: April 17, 2012
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON HIGHER EDUCATION
Marty Block, Chair
AB 1741 (Fong) - As Amended: March 20, 2012
SUBJECT : California Community Colleges: Student Success
Infrastructure Act of 2012.
SUMMARY : Requires the California Community Colleges (CCC)
Board of Governors to develop a plan for supporting specified
goals as part of its efforts to improve student success that are
contained in SB 1456 (Lowenthal), pending in the Senate.
Specifically, this bill :
1)Establishes the Student Success Infrastructure Act of 2012 to
do the following:
a) Provide the necessary counseling and instructional
infrastructure at CCC to ensure that students have the
access to support services and classroom instructors to
increase their opportunities for success.
b) Complement the Seymour-Campbell Student Success Act of
2012 (SB 1456, Lowenthal) in its purpose of providing
improved orientation and counseling services to student and
greater access to instructional faculty.
2)Establishes the Student Success Infrastructure Fund in the
State Treasury for the purpose of funding the following goals:
a) Increasing the ratio of faculty counselors to students;
b) Restoring categorical programs that provide student
support services;
c) Increasing the percentage of hours of credit instruction
that are taught by full-time instructors consistent with
existing law that sets a goal of 75% full-time to 25%
part-time faculty; and,
d) Improving the professionalization of part-time faculty,
including, but not limited to, expanding part-time office
hours consistent with student needs.
AB 1741
Page 2
3)Requires the CCC Board of Governors to develop a plan to
support the goals of the Seymour-Campbell Student Success Act
and the Student Success Infrastructure Act, consistent with
the needs of individual districts and statewide policies
regarding student success.
4)Declares this bill is only operative to the extent funds are
appropriated for this purpose in the 2012-13 fiscal year and
successive fiscal years.
EXISTING LAW :
1)Known as the Seymour-Campbell Matriculation Act of 1986,
establishes a matriculation process at CCC for the purpose of
realizing a student's educational objectives. (Education Code
� 78212)
2)Requires CCC to convene a task force, as specified, to make
recommendations to the Legislature for improving CCC student
success. (SB 1143, Liu, Chapter 409, Statutes of 2010)
FISCAL EFFECT : Unknown
COMMENTS : Background . CCC is the educational gateway for 2.6
million students, representing nearly 25% of the nation's
community college student population. However, students are
rapidly losing access as course offerings have been reduced due
to budget cuts, and numerous reports have shown that those who
cannot get courses too often do not reach their education
goals-between 53% and 41% depending on the goal identified-and
the statistics are much lower for Latino and African American
students.
CCC Student Success Task Force . The Legislature passed SB 1143,
Liu, Chapter 409, Statutes of 2010, to require the CCC
Chancellor to convene a task force of stakeholders to make
recommendations to the Legislature to improve CCC student
success. After a year of study and research, this January the
CCC Student Success Task Force (SSTF) issued a report with 22
recommendations to improve CCC students' success in completing
their certificates, degrees and educational goals.
The recommendations are designed to refocus priorities on the
core missions of remedial education, workforce preparation,
certificate and degree attainment, and transfer, by improving
AB 1741
Page 3
matriculation services and incentivizing successful student
behaviors, aligning course offerings to student needs, improving
basic skills education and professional development,
strengthening statewide CCC leadership, increasing CCC
coordination, maintaining a student success scorecard and data
system, and aligning resources with these recommendations. The
Assembly Higher Education Committee, the Senate Education
Committee, and Senate Budget Subcommittee on Education held an
oversight hearing on the SSTF recommendations on February 1,
2012.
Faculty views on SSTF . The SSTF included five faculty members.
However, the statewide CCC Academic Senate, the Faculty
Association of California Community Colleges (FACCC), the
California Teachers Association, the California Federation of
Teachers, and the California Community College Independents,
have expressed concern that the recommendations narrow the CCC
mission, take key academic decisions out of the purview of the
local faculty, could negatively impact disadvantaged students,
and do not address key needs, including restoring general and
categorical funding.
How will the SSFT recommendations be implemented ? Most of the
recommendations can be implemented through regulation, the
budget, or state administrative policy. Six recommendations
require statutory changes, most of which are contained in SB
1456 (Lowenthal), pending in the Senate. SB 1456 refocuses the
existing matriculation process on providing student support
services to students on the front-end of their educational
experience as follows:
1)Target student success and support funds for assessment,
orientation, and education planning services and authorize the
Board of Governors to establish policies that eventually
require students to complete these services and provide for
exemptions when necessary.
2)Require that campuses participate in a common assessment
system and post a student success campus score card as a
condition for receiving student success categorical funding;
and,
3)Establish new requirements and conditions for students to
receive a Board of Governors fee waiver that include
identifying a degree, certificate, transfer or career
AB 1741
Page 4
advancement goal and meeting academic and progress standards,
including a requirement that students not accumulate more than
a specified number of units, excluding basic skills and
English-as-a-Second-Language coursework. SB 1456 also
authorizes the Board of Governors to determine the unit cap
and develop policies that provide statewide guidance to
colleges on implementing an intervention and appeals process
for the new fee waiver requirements.
Need for this bill . According to the author, this bill is
designed to complement SB 1456 in its goal of providing greater
levels of orientation and counseling to students and access to
instructional faculty. The four priority items addressed in this
bill all constitute indispensable infrastructure for a system of
higher education that may move in a direction (assuming passage
of SB 1456) in which students are rewarded or punished based
upon their ability to develop and stick to an education plan.
What does this bill do ? This bill would require the CCC Board
of Governors to develop a plan to provide budgetary support for
the goals of SB 1456 and the following goals:
1)Increasing the ratio of faculty counselors to students;
2)Restoring categorical programs that provide student support
services;
3)Increasing the percentage of hours of credit instruction that
are taught by full-time instructors consistent with existing
law that sets a goal of 75% full-time to 25% part-time
faculty; and,
4)Improving the professionalization of part-time faculty,
including, but not limited to, expanding part-time office
hours consistent with student needs.
Is this bill a complement or a competitor ? The SSTF recommends
that a Student Support Initiative be a top priority for new CCC
monies to support efforts to improve students' success based on
local needs, including but not limited to, implementing
diagnostic assessments, orientation, and education planning.
The SSTF did not identify the four funding priorities contained
in this bill as necessary first steps to improving student
success.
AB 1741
Page 5
Arguments in support . According to FACCC, this bill's sponsor,
the four areas identified in this bill are necessary to increase
the potential for student success. FACCC states, "We believe
this measure should be viewed as a companion piece to SB 1456
(Lowenthal), legislation implementing major components of the
Student Success Task Force. Since September, we have relayed
our concerns to the Chancellor's Office and to legislative
offices that it would be both improper and unrealistic to expect
as major a shift in our community college system as envisioned
by the Student Success Task Force without proper attention to
the infrastructure referenced in AB 1741."
Arguments in opposition . According to the CCC Chancellor's
Office, this bill suggests that student improvement can only be
achieved once the goals of the Student Success Infrastructure
Act are funded and does not acknowledge that there are interim
steps that can be taken without incurring new costs. Moreover,
once there are new resources available, AB 1741 proposes to fund
existing models without considering new and innovative
approaches to serving students as cost-effectively as possible.
The Chancellor's Office also notes that many of the funding
priorities in this bill are outside the policies addressed by SB
1456, stating, "AB 1741 is loaded down with a laundry list of
investments that, while meritorious, are outside the scope of SB
1456."
REGISTERED SUPPORT / OPPOSITION :
Support
American Association of University Women
California Community College Independents
California Federation of Teachers
Faculty Association of California Community Colleges (sponsor)
Gavilan College Faculty Association
Opposition
California Community College Chancellor's Office
Analysis Prepared by : Sandra Fried / HIGHER ED. / (916)
319-3960
AB 1741
Page 6