BILL ANALYSIS �
Senate Appropriations Committee Fiscal Summary
Senator Christine Kehoe, Chair
AB 1919 (Brownley) - Charter Schools: Achievement Data.
Amended: July 2, 2012 Policy Vote: Education 8-1
Urgency: No Mandate: No
Hearing Date: August 6, 2012
Consultant: Jacqueline Wong-Hernandez
This bill meets the criteria for referral to the Suspense File.
Bill Summary: AB 1919 requires the California Department of
Education (CDE) to provide a secondary Academic Performance
Index (API) score that includes the scores of the charter
schools for which a school district is the chartering authority;
and, provide other student achievement data as specified in
accordance with the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act
(FERPA).
Fiscal Impact:
Second API: $42,000 (General Fund) in consultant costs to
calculate secondary APIs for all school districts which
authorize charter schools.
Student achievement data: $50,000 (General Fund) in
one-time costs to upgrade the California Longitudinal Pupil
Achievement Data System (CALPADS) system to share charter
school pupil-level achievement data with the authorizing
districts.
Background: Existing law specifies that a school district may
provide statistical data to a public agency or entity, private
nonprofit college, university, or educational research and
development organization, as long as no individual pupil may be
identified from the data. (Education Code � 49076)
Existing law requires every pupil to have an individual record
of accomplishment by the end of grade 12 that includes the
results of achievement tests administered as part of the
Standardized Testing and Reporting (STAR) Program, the results
of end-of-course exams, and any vocational education
certification exams a pupil may have taken. Existing law further
specifies that a pupil's record is private and may not be
released to any person other than the pupil's parent or
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guardian, or a teacher, counselor, or administrator directly
involved with the pupil, without the express written consent of
either the parent or guardian if the pupil is a minor, or the
pupil if the pupil has reached the age of majority or is
emancipated. (EC � 60607)
Existing federal law, the FERPA, generally prohibits the
improper disclosure of personally identifiable information
derived from education records. FERPA applies to all educational
agencies and institutions that receive funding under any program
administered by the U.S. Department of Education. Under FERPA,
schools are required to provide certain privacy protections for
the educational records they maintain.
Existing law requires a charter school to meet at least one of
the following performance standards in order to be renewed: (1)
attainment of the school's API growth target in two of the last
three years or in the aggregate last three years; (2) an API
decile ranking of four or better in the prior year or in two of
the last three years; (3) a Similar Schools API ranking of four
or better in two of the last three years; (4) academic
performance that is at least equal to the academic performance
of the public schools that the charter school pupils would
otherwise been required to attend; or (5) qualification for
participation in the Alternative School Accountability Model.
(EC � 47607)
Proposed Law: AB 1919 requires the CDE to calculate and provide
a secondary API score that includes the scores of the charter
schools for which a school district is the chartering authority,
and that a school district's secondary API score to be used only
for school district purposes. This bill also requires the CDE to
provide the following information to a school district
authorizing a charter school:
1) Individual pupil demographic data, program data, and
achievement data, including but not limited to, the results
of the standards-based achievement tests that are part of
the STAR Program, the English Language Development Test,
and the California High School Exit Exam, relating to
pupils who attend a charter school for which the school
district is the chartering authority.
2) Individual pupil results for pupils attending a charter
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school for which the school district is the chartering
authority, to the extent it has it, along with unique pupil
identification number of each of those pupils, in
accordance with FERPA.
3) Access to view and download the individual pupil records in
the CALPADS for pupils who attend a charter school for
which the school district is the chartering authority, in
accordance with FERPA.
Staff Comments: This bill requires the CDE to calculate a second
API score for all school districts that authorize charter
schools, which includes the performance of the charter school
pupils. A district would have one API score used for official
accountability purposes, and a second score that it could use
only internally. The CDE calculates the accountability scores
for each district and school, annually. It estimates that
calculating a second score for the numerous districts that
authorize approximately 1,000 charter schools will result in
annual expenses of $42,000 for two temporary (two-month)
consultants to complete this work.
This bill further requires the CDE to share certain pupil
achievement data, to the degree it can without violating FERPA,
in forms specified in the bill. In 2010, LAUSD requested student
level assessment data for pupils attending charter schools that
it authorized. Then-Superintendent Jack O'Connell denied the
request, citing current law, which does not allow a pupil's STAR
results to be released to anyone other than the student, parent,
law enforcement, or the school where the student is enrolled.
This bill specifically requires that districts be given CALPADS
access to view and download the pupil records. The CDE has
indicated that this level of information sharing will require a
one-time change to the CALPADS, which will cost $50,000 General
Fund.