BILL ANALYSIS �
AB 342
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Date of Hearing: April 17, 2013
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION
Joan Buchanan, Chair
AB 342 (Blumenfield) - As Amended: April 2, 2013
SUMMARY : Adds charter schools to the local education agencies
(LEAs) that can claim pupil attendance for funding purposes for
pupils in grades 9 to 12, inclusive, receiving technology-based,
synchronous instruction, and allows all LEAs to claim pupil
attendance for funding purposes for pupils receiving
technology-based, asynchronous instruction. Specifically, this
bill :
1)Changes Education Code terminology from "synchronous, online
instruction" to "technology-based synchronous instruction."
2)Allows charter schools to claim the average daily attendance
(ADA) of pupils for funding purposes (apportionment ADA) for
pupils who receive technology-based, synchronous instruction.
3)Deletes the requirements that pupils receiving synchronous,
online instruction be under the immediate supervision and
control of a certificated employee of the school LEA in order
to generate apportionment ADA and instead requires that such
pupils be under the supervision and control of the employee
(i.e., strikes "immediate").
4)Authorizes the disaggregation of pupil test results to allow
the comparison of the results of online instruction vs.
regular classroom instruction.
5)Requires technology-based, synchronous instruction to:
a) Be approved by the governing board of the LEA;
b) Be as rigorous as a classroom-based course; and
c) Meet or exceed all relevant state standards.
6)Allows LEAs (school districts, county offices of education,
and charter schools) to claim apportionment ADA for pupils in
grades 9 to 12, inclusive, who receive technology-based
asynchronous instruction, provided that all of the following
occur:
a) Periodic contact occurs between the certificated
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employee providing the instruction and the pupil to assess
satisfactory educational progress;
b) The LEA maintains a paper or electronic copy of a
written agreement for each pupil receiving technology-based
asynchronous instruction;
c) The LEA retains written or electronic documentation that
demonstrates satisfactory educational progress for each
pupil receiving technology-based asynchronous instruction;
d) The technology-based asynchronous course has been
approved by the governing board, is as rigorous as a
classroom-based course, and meets or exceeds all relevant
content standards.
7)Defines "technology-based asynchronous instruction" to mean a
course or class in which the pupil and the certificated
employee who is providing instruction may be online at
different times, allowing pupils and certificated employees to
participate according to their own schedules.
8)Defines "satisfactory educational progress" to include
measures such as applicable statewide accountability measures
and assessments, the completion of assignments, required labs
or online workgroups, or other indicators that the pupil is
working on assignments and learning required concepts as
determined by the supervising certificated employee.
9)Provides that, if no satisfactory progress has been made, an
evaluation shall be made to determine if it is in the best
interest of the pupil to remain in asynchronous instruction.
10)Requires a written record of the evaluation to be made and
maintained for three years and forwarded with pupil records if
the pupil transfers to another public school.
11)Prohibits a pupil from continuing in asynchronous instruction
without evidence of satisfactory educational progress unless
such instruction is determined by the school district or
county office of education superintendent or charter school
administrator to be in the best interests of the pupil.
12)Requires the LEA to maintain a paper or electronic copy of a
written agreement for each pupil engaged in asynchronous
instruction and requires the agreement to include, but not be
limited to:
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a) A statement of the LEA's policies that specify periodic
contact between pupils and certificated employees and
identifies the accountability measures and assessments that
will be used to determine satisfactory educational
progress;
b) The duration of the asynchronous instruction written
agreement;
c) A statement of the number of course credits to be earned
upon completion and the learning objectives required to
achieve satisfactory education progress;
d) A statement that synchronous instruction is an optional
educational alternative in which no pupil may be required
to participate.
e) A statement that asynchronous instruction may be
provided to an expelled or suspended pupil only if that
pupil is offered the alternative of classroom instruction.
13)Requires the written statement to be signed by the pupil; the
pupil's parent, guardian, or caregiver; and, if the pupil is
less than 18 years of age, the certificated employee who is
responsible for the general supervision of independent study.
14)Defines "electronic copy" to include a computer or electronic
stored image of an original document.
15)Requires LEAs to retain written or electronic documentation
that demonstrates satisfactory educational progress for pupils
engaged in asynchronous instruction.
16)Provides that a special needs pupil may receive asynchronous
instruction only if it is provided for in his or her
individualized education plan.
17)Prohibits an LEA that offers asynchronous instruction from
denying such instruction to a pupil based solely on the
pupil's lack of access to the computer hardware or software
necessary to participate in the course, and requires the LEA
to provide such access to a pupil who chooses to enroll in a
technology-based asynchronous course.
EXISTING LAW
1)Defines "synchronous online instruction" as a class or course
in which the pupil and the certificated employee who is
providing instruction are online at the same time and use
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real-time, Internet-based collaborative software that combines
audio, video, file sharing, and other forms of interaction.
2)Authorizes, commencing with the 2014-15 fiscal year, a school
district or county office of education (COE) to claim
attendance for pupils in grades 9 to 12, inclusive, who are
engaged in synchronous online instruction toward apportionment
ADA, provided all of the following conditions are met:
a) The certificated employee providing instruction confirms
pupil attendance through visual recognition or periodic
voice responses during the class period;
b) The class has a regularly scheduled starting and ending
time, and the pupil is scheduled to attend the entire class
period;
c) An individual with exceptional needs, as specified, may
participate in synchronous online instruction only if his
or her individualized education program, as specified,
provides for that participation;
d) A school district or COE offering synchronous online
instruction shall not deny enrollment to a pupil based
solely on the pupil's lack of access to the computer
hardware or software necessary to participate in the
course; and if a pupil does not have access to the
necessary equipment, the school district or COE shall
provide such access; and
e) The ratio of teachers to pupils shall not exceed the
equivalent ratio for all other educational programs by the
school district or COE, as specified, unless a higher or
lower ratio is negotiated in a collective bargaining
agreement.
3)Requires the Superintendent of Public Instruction (SPI) to
establish rules and regulation that, at a minimum, address all
of the following:
a) How school districts and COEs include pupil attendance
in online courses in the calculation of ADA;
b) How to ensure a pupil meets minimum instructional time
requirements;
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c) Require statewide testing results for online pupils to
be reported and assigned to the school in which the pupils
is enrolled for regular classroom courses and to any school
district or COE within which the school's testing results
are aggregated; and
d) Require online instruction attendance accounting to be
subject to annual audits.
4)Authorizes school districts and COEs to offer independent
study and to generate apportionment ADA for pupils engaged in
independent study, subject to the following:
a) Not more than 10 percent of pupils in an opportunity
school or program or a continuation high school may be
eligible for apportionment credit for independent study;
b) Special needs pupils may participate in independent
study only if it is specifically provided for in their
individualized education plans;
c) Instruction provided to a temporarily disabled pupil
shall not be provided through independent study;
d) Courses required for high school graduation shall not be
offered exclusively through independent study;
e) Pupils enrolled in independent study shall have access
to all existing services and resources of the school in
which he or she is enrolled and that are available to all
other pupils in the school; and
f) The governing board of the school district has adopted
and implemented written policies, as specified, that govern
independent study and the written agreement that is
required for each independent study pupil.
5)Prohibits LEAs from providing independent study pupils with
funds or any other thing of value that it does not provide to
pupils who attend regular classes.
6)Provides that school districts and COEs can claim
apportionment credit for independent study only to the extent
of the time value of pupil work products as personally judged
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in each instance by a certificated teacher.
FISCAL EFFECT : Unknown
COMMENTS : This bill provides that students would generate
apportionment ADA for the time they spend out of school engaged
in online learning, even if at the same time the teacher is not
actively providing instruction. Under existing law, students
also generate apportionment ADA for independent study. However,
existing law imposes limitations and requirements on independent
study that this bill does not impose on online learning. First,
a student can generate apportionment ADA for independent study
only to the extent of the time value of the student's work
products as personally judged by a certificated teacher.
Second, the ratio of ADA for independent study students 18 years
of age or less to school district full-time equivalent
certificated employees responsible for independent study cannot
exceed the equivalent ratio of students to full-time
certificated employees for all other education programs operated
by the school district. This prevents independent study from
becoming a "profit center" for the school district. Third,
existing law expresses the intent of the Legislature that
independent study students have access to all existing services
and resources that are available to other students in the school
as well as existing resources such as a designated learning or
study center staffed by appropriately trained personnel. Taken
together, these three provision help ensure that independent
study students have access to the same range of services as
provided all other students.
According to the author's office, the independent study model is
a "band-aid approach" that "is not easily scalable to the nature
of online courses, [which] more closely resemble traditional
classes and are designed to serve many students at once."
Accordingly, the purpose of this bill is to allow schools to
claim apportionment ADA for entire classes that are offered
online. Potentially, courses could be offered exclusively
online.
The ADA-based system of school finance may not be appropriate
for online courses . Schools are funded on the basis of average
daily attendance (ADA). This is sometimes referred to as
"paying for student seat time," but this is a
mischaracterization. In fact, schools are funded largely for
the time teachers and other school employees need to provide
instruction, instructional support, and other service.. ADA is
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a proxy for this, because the time that students spend in
attendance is the time they are receiving services.
By contrast, "attendance" at an online class, or the amount of
time a student spends online, bears no relationship to the time
teachers and other school employees spend to provide the online
instruction. Online instruction offers many economies of scale
that are not available to classroom instruction. For example,
the Florida Virtual School, which is the largest state-funded
online K-12 school in the nation, has a budget of $166.3
million, enrolls 130,000 students, and has nearly 1,500
employees, according to the Tampa Bay Times. Accordingly, the
staffing ratio is about 86 students per employee, and funding is
nearly $111,000 per employee and $1,280 per student. The
committee may wish to consider whether schools should receive
the full ADA level of funding for pupils enrolled in online
courses.
Online instruction has not been shown to be effective . The use
of online instruction has grown in recent years, but there have
been few well-controlled studies of its effectiveness with K-12
students. This is the main finding from a review of the
research reported by the U. S. Department of Education (USDOE)
in September 2010 ("Evaluation of Evidence-Based Practices in
Online Learning: A Meta-Analysis and Review of Online Learning
Studies"). The USDOE report contains the findings of a
meta-analysis of research on online learning, which concludes
that "on average, students in online learning conditions
performed modestly better than those receiving face-to-face
instruction." However, the report cautions against generalizing
this finding to the K-12 population, because only five of the 45
studies in the analysis involved K-12 instruction. (The others
involved medical training, higher education, and other non-K-12
instruction.) All of the five K-12 studies involved blended
instruction, in which online learning is combined with
face-to-face instruction. Because blended instruction often
includes additional instructional time, the positive effects
observed with this approach may be the result of the additional
time on task, and cannot be attributed to the media, per se,
according to the USDOE report.
More recent studies indicate online instruction alone is not as
effective as regular classroom instruction:
A 2011 study of charter school performance in
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Pennsylvania by the Center for Research on Education
Outcomes (CREDO) at Stanford University found that each of
that state's 8 online charter schools ("cyber schools")
significantly underperformed brick and mortar schools and
regular (non-virtual) charter schools in reading and math.
A review of virtual schools in Wisconsin by the Gannett
Wisconsin Media Investigative Team found that students
receiving online instruction "often struggle to complete
their degrees and repeat grades four times as often as
their brick-and-mortar counterparts," and they "trail
traditional students in every subject but reading."
A 2011 report from the Office of the Legislative Auditor
in Minnesota reported that full-time online students were
more likely to completely drop out of school and made less
progress on state standardized math tests than students in
traditional schools.
A 2011 report from the Ohio Department of Education
rated only three of Ohio's 27 virtual schools as
"effective" or "excellent."
A 2006 performance audit by the Colorado Department of
Education of that state's virtual schools found that, "in
the aggregate, online students performed poorly on the CSAP
(Colorado State Assessment Program) exams and had higher
repeater, attrition, and dropout rates."
The Florida Virtual Academy, a statewide virtual school,
reports that 81% of its students who complete their courses
receive a passing grade. However, the Tampa Bay Times
reports that the Virtual Academy's records show that
two-thirds of students who enroll in a course don't finish
it. When dropouts are included, the actual pass rate is
28%. The Times was unable to get Virtual School Florida
Comprehensive Assessment Test scores from either the
Virtual School or the Florida Department of Education.
Given these findings, the committee may wish to consider whether
further research would be prudent before allowing districts to
claim apportionment ADA for an unlimited amount of online
instruction.
Related legislation . Prior legislation allowing districts to
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claim apportionment ADA for asynchronous, online instruction
includes AB 2027 (Blumenfield) in 2010, which died in the Senate
Appropriations Committee; and AB 802 (Blumenfield) in 2011,
which died in the Assembly Appropriations Committee. AB 644
(Blumenfield, Chapter 579, Statutes of 2012) was amended to
allow ADA funding only for synchronous instruction, subject to
specified conditions.
AB 377 (Grove), which permits the establishment of statewide
virtual charter schools, is pending in the Assembly Education
Committee.
REGISTERED SUPPORT / OPPOSITION :
Support
San Diego County Office of Education
Small School Districts' Association
Opposition
None received
Analysis Prepared by : Rick Pratt / ED. / (916) 319-2087