BILL ANALYSIS �
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|SENATE RULES COMMITTEE | SB 645|
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THIRD READING
Bill No: SB 645
Author: Simitian (D)
Amended: 5/11/11
Vote: 21
SENATE EDUCATION COMMITTEE : 7-1, 5/4/11
AYES: Lowenthal, Alquist, Huff, Liu, Price, Simitian,
Vargas
NOES: Blakeslee
NO VOTE RECORDED: Runner, Hancock, Vacancy
SENATE APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE : 8-0, 5/26/11
AYES: Kehoe, Walters, Alquist, Lieu, Pavley, Price,
Runner, Steinberg
NO VOTE RECORDED: Emmerson
SUBJECT : Charter schools: charter renewal
SOURCE : California Charter Schools Association
DIGEST : This bill establishes new criteria for charter
school renewal and authorizes a charter school not meeting
the renewal criteria to apply to the State Board of
Education for a determination of academic eligibility for
the renewal of its charter by submitting evidence of the
schools' academic success, as specified.
ANALYSIS : Existing law, the Charter Schools Act of 1992,
provides for the establishment of charter schools in
California for the purpose, among other things, of
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improving student learning and expanding learning
experiences for pupils who are identified as academically
low achieving. A charter school may be authorized by a
school district, a county board of education, or the State
Board of Education (SBE), as specified.
Existing law authorizes a charter to be granted for not
more than five years and specifies that each renewal shall
be for five years. Existing law requires the renewal and
any material revision of the provisions of the charter to
be made only with the approval of the authority that
granted the charter.
Existing law specifies that after a charter school has been
in operation for four years, it shall meet at least one of
the following criteria in order to be renewed:
1.Attainment of the school's Academic Performance Index
(API) growth target in two of the last three years or in
the aggregate last three years.
2.A ranking in deciles 4 to 10, inclusive, on the API in
the prior year or in two of the last three years.
3.A ranking in deciles 4 to 10, inclusive, on the API for a
demographically comparable school 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.
5.Qualification for participation in the Alternative School
Accountability Model (ASAM).
Existing law requires the Superintendent of Public
Instruction (SPI), with approval of the State Board of
Education, to develop an alternative accountability system
for schools under the jurisdiction of a county board of
education or county superintendent of schools, community
day schools, nonpublic, nonsectarian schools, and
alternative schools serving high-risk pupils, including
continuation high schools and opportunity schools. Schools
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on the ASAM may receive an API score, are not included in
the API rankings.
Existing law requires the SPI and the SBE to establish a
list of low achieving and persistently lowest-achieving
schools and provides that schools that have experienced
academic growth of at least 50 points over the previous
five years as measured by the API may be excluded from the
list.
Existing law expresses the intent of the Legislature that
the Public Schools Accountability Act (PSAA) Advisory
Committee consider various ways to measure performance
levels of cohort growth in which each pupil, subgroup,
school, and school district make at least one year's
academic growth in one year's time and whether that growth
is sufficient to reach a performance level of proficiency
within the timeframes specified in the state's approved
accountability plan required pursuant to the Elementary and
Secondary Education Act (ESEA). It further requires any
measure of annual academic achievement growth by cohort
approved for inclusion in the API or adopted through a
state plan pursuant to the ESEA as a requirement of
receiving or allocating federal funds must utilize a growth
model in the public domain that is not proprietary, be able
to be replicated by an independent statistician, and be
able to be fully and accurately explained in a document
made available to the public.
This bill:
1.Prohibits an authorizer of a charter school that has been
in operation for at least four years from considering or
granting the renewal of the school's charter unless the
school, based on data available as of October 1 of the
fiscal year of renewal, meets one of the following
criteria before having its charter renewed:
A. Attain an API score of at least 700 in the most
recent year.
B. Attain a cumulative API growth of at least 30
points over the last three API cycles, and defines
API growth for one cycle to mean the difference
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between a current year growth API and the prior
year's base API. Specifies that the growth required
shall not be measured as the difference between the
most recent growth API score and the growth API score
from three years prior to that score.
C. Rank in deciles 6 to 10, inclusive, on the API for
a demographically comparable school in the prior year
or in two of the last three years for which
demographically comparable school rank are available.
Specifies that a school that does not generate a
demographically comparable school rank is ineligible
to meet this criterion.
D. Participation in the alternative accountability
system.
E. Receipt of positive determination of academic
eligibility for renewal from the SBE within the prior
12 months.
F. Provides that a charter school that does not meet
at least one of the above criteria may apply to the
SBE for a determination of academic eligibility for
renewal of its charter by submitting evidence of the
school's academic success.
G. Specifies that a charter school that does not meet
at least one of the above criteria may apply to the
SBE for a determination of academic eligibility for
renewal of its charter by submitting evidence of the
school's academic success. Evidence supporting the
application may include, but is not limited to,
information on individual pupil achievement,
including longitudinal data that demonstrates
individual pupil progress, analysis of similar pupil
populations, or other relevant data as determined by
the school.
2.Requires the advisory committee appointed by the SBE to
recommend criteria for the determination of funding for
nonclassroom-based instruction to publicly hear an
application for a determination of academic ineligibility
for the renewal of a charter, and makes a recommendation
to the SBE on the application.
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3.Requires the SBE to issue a positive determination of
academic ineligibility if the SBE finds that the charter
school adequately demonstrates that the academic
performance of the charter school meets or exceeds its
predicted performance based on a statistical evaluation
of similar pupil populations.
Comments
Need for the Bill . According to the author's office,
this bill seeks to remedy two failures in the current
renewal process: measurements of school success that are
too forgiving and tolerant of persistent failure, and
charter school authorizers that succumb to political
pressure and renew the charters of failing schools.
In its recently released report, "Portrait of the Movement:
How Charters are Transforming California Education," the
CCSA introduces a performance framework for charter schools
and describes the Similar Students Measure, which assesses
school performance while filtering out many non-school
effects on student achievement through the use of
regression-based predictive modeling. The bill compares a
schools' API to a predicted API that controls for the
effects of student background on performance. According to
CCSA, the framework includes absolute status and growth
over time on the API with the SSM to "create a more
comprehensive approach to classifying the performance of
charter schools." This bill reflects this framework in the
proposed renewal criteria and in the process the SBE will
use to determine academic ineligibility.
Related/Prior Legislation
SB 433 (Liu), 2011-12 Session, requires charter schools to
comply with state statutes governing the suspension and
expulsion of students. (In Senate Education Committee)
AB 86 (Mendoza), 2011-12 Session, requires charter school
petitioners to obtain the signatures of classified
employees, as specified. (In Senate Education Committee)
AB 401 (Ammiano), 2011-12 Session, limits, until January 1,
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2023, the total number of charter schools authorized to
operate at 1,450 and adds additional criteria relating to
the disclosure of relatives of charter school personnel.
(In Senate Rules Committee)
AB 360 (Brownley), 2011-12 Session, makes charter schools
subject to the Ralph M. Brown Act or Bagley-Keene Open
Meeting Act, depending on the entity operating the school.
Also subjects charters to the California Public Records Act
and the Political Reform Act. (In Senate Rules Committee)
AB 440 (Brownley), 2011-12 Session, establishes various
academic and fiscal accountability standards related to
charter schools. (In Assembly Appropriations Committee)
AB 1034 (Gatto), 2011-12 Session, requires charter schools
to report specified information relating to pupil
demographics and academic progress, requires charter
schools to collect data regarding pupils who transfer out
of the school, and modifies existing laws regarding charter
school admissions. (On Assembly Appropriations Committee
Suspense File)
AB 1741 (Coto), 2009-10 Session, would have required
charter schools that expect 15 percent of their pupil
population to be English learners to meet additional
petition requirements relating to the education of those
students. (Died in Senate Rules Committee)
AB 1982 (Ammiano), 2009-10 Session, would have limited,
until January 1, 2017, the total number of charter schools
authorized to operate at 1450 and prohibits charter schools
operated by a private entity from employing relatives, as
specified. (Failed passage in Senate Education Committee)
AB 1991 (Arambula), 2009-10 Session, would have authorized
charter school renewals to be granted for five to ten
years. (Failed passage in Assembly Education Committee)
AB 2320 (Swanson), 2009-10 Session, would have added new
requirements to the charter school petition process,
deletes the authority of a charter school petitioner to
submit a petition to a county board of education to serve
pupils that would otherwise be served by the county office
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of education, and eliminates the ability of the SBE to
approve charter school petition appeals. (Failed passage
in Senate Education Committee)
AB 2363 (Mendoza), 2009-10 Session, would have required
charter school petitioners to obtain the signatures of
permanent classified employees, as specified. (Failed
passage in Senate Education Committee)
AB 572 (Brownley), 2009-10 Session, would have required
charter schools to comply with the Ralph M. Brown Act, the
California Public Records Act, and the Political Reform
Act. Passed the Senate with a vote of 21-14 on August 24,
2010. The bill was subsequently vetoed by Governor
Schwarzenegger. In his veto message, the Governor stated:
"Charter school educators have proven that poverty is
not destiny for students that attend public schools in
California. Repeatedly, charter schools with high
proportions of disadvantaged students are among the
highest performing public schools in California. Any
attempt to regulate charter schools with incoherent and
inconsistent cross-references to other statutes is
simply misguided. Parents do not need renewed faith in
charter schools as suggested in this bill. On the
contrary, tens of thousands of parents in California
have children on waiting lists to attend a public
charter school. Legislation expressing findings and
intent to provide "greater autonomy to charter schools"
may be well intended at first glance. A careful
reading of the bill reveals that the proposed changes
apply new and contradictory requirements, which would
put hundreds of schools immediately out of compliance,
making it obvious that it is simply another veiled
attempt to discourage competition and stifle efforts to
aid the expansion of charter schools."
ABX5 8 (Brownley), 2009-10 Session, would have deleted the
cap on charter schools and would have made other changes to
provisions governing audit and fiscal standards, and the
authorization, renewal and revocation of charter schools.
(Held in Senate Education Committee)
FISCAL EFFECT : Appropriation: No Fiscal Com.: Yes
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Local: No
Fiscal Impact (in thousands)
Major Provisions 2011-12 2012-13
2013-14 Fund
SBE eligibility Potentially significant
ongoing costs General
determination
New renewal criteria Potential savings/costs in future
years General
and process
SUPPORT : (Verified 5/27/11)
California Charter Schools Association (source)
ACE Charter Schools
Bullis Charter School
Charter Academy of the Redwoods
Classical Academies
Darnall Charter School
Fenton Avenue Charter School
Fenton Primary Center
Green Dot Public Schools
Guajome Park Academy
Inland Leaders Charter School
King-Chavez Neighborhood of Schools
KIPP: Bay Area Schools
Lewis Center for Educational Research
New Vision Middle School
Oakland Military Institute - College Preparatory Academy
Pacific Collegiate School
Para Los Ninos
Rocketship Education
SOAR Charter Academy
Sycamore Academy of Science and Cultural Arts
The Classical Academies
OPPOSITION : (Verified 5/27/11)
California School Boards Association
California Teachers Association
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Charter schools Development Center
K12, Inc.
ARGUMENTS IN SUPPORT : According to the sponsor of this
bill, the California Charter Schools Association (CCSA),
the state needs to establish an accountability framework
for charter schools that includes standards that
effectively measure the success of charter schools and a
mechanism to insure swift, objective, and unbiased action
on persistently low-achieving schools.
ARGUMENTS IN OPPOSITION : The Charter Schools Development
Center, in opposition, believes that this bill creates
unreasonably high and arbitrary charter renewal standards,
would substantially increase the workload of the SBE and
the SPI, establishes a strong incentive for charter schools
to seek out students who are likely to perform well on
state tests, and discourages schools form serving
academically-challenged students.
K-12, Inc. writes, in opposition, "?legislation does not
adequately address student populations. Many charter
schools have student populations that may change throughout
the year and a property way to view the success of these
students would be to include some form of growth model in
the legislation. The API score is an imperfect measurement
that may be changing in the near future. It does not take
into account where a student was academically when they
entered the school and how much growth that student made at
that particular school"
In opposition, the California School Boards Association
writes, "CSBA opposes SB 645 because it would erode a local
school district's authority over charter renewals. In the
event a charter school fails to meet any of the proposed
renewal criteria, it would have the option of applying to
the SBE for a determination of academic eligibility.
Although the renewal decision would reside with the local
school board, the decision would be subject to appeal. The
granting of the determination of academic eligibility by
SBE would be tantamount to a renewal, as the SBE would be
likely to approve any petition upon appeal that received
the SBE's determination of academic eligibility."
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CPM:cm 5/27/11 Senate Floor Analyses
SUPPORT/OPPOSITION: SEE ABOVE
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