BILL ANALYSIS �
Senate Appropriations Committee Fiscal Summary
Senator Kevin de Le�n, Chair
SB 1082 (Huff) - Parent Resources Website
Amended: April 9, 2014 Policy Vote: Education 8-0
Urgency: No Mandate: No
Hearing Date: April 28, 2014
Consultant: Jacqueline Wong-Hernandez
This bill meets the criteria for referral to the Suspense File.
Bill Summary: SB 1082 requires the California Department of
Education (CDE) to create a dedicated parent resources Internet
website that provides specified information concerning public
education and specified school level data.
Fiscal Impact:
Website design/creation: $150,000 (General Fund) in
one-time contracting costs to create a website meeting the
requirements of this bill, including the specifications of
the searchable database and posting the LCAPs. Costs would
increase if the CDE hire new staff to build the website.
Website maintenance: Significant on-going costs and staff
time, likely in the low tens of thousands of dollars
annually, to update the website and database to stay
current.
Background: Various state and federal laws govern state and
local responsibilities to public school students, and those
students' educational entitlements. Pertinent to this bill, are:
Open Enrollment Act: Enacted as a way to improve student
achievement and enhance parental choice in education, the Open
Enrollment Act provides options to certain pupils to enroll in
public schools throughout the state without regard to their
residence. It gives students enrolled in one of the 1,000 Open
Enrollment schools, identified by the Superintendent of Public
Instruction using statutory criteria, the option to enroll in a
school within the same district or any other district with a
higher Academic Performance Index (API) score than the pupil's
school of residence.
(Education Code � 48350 et. seq.)
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School Districts of Choice: Existing law authorizes
inter-district transfers known as "school districts of choice"
in which the governing board of a school district may declare
the district to be a district of choice that is willing to
accept a specified number of inter-district transfer pupils. A
district that elects to participate must admit students through
a random process that prohibits enrollment based on academic or
athletic performance. School districts of choice must give
priority for attendance to siblings of pupils already in
attendance in that district. A district of choice may reject the
transfer of a pupil if that transfer would require the district
to create a new program to serve that pupil, but prohibits a
district of choice from rejecting the transfer of special needs
pupils, individuals with exceptional needs, and English
learners. These provisions sunset on July 1, 2016. (EC � 48300
et. seq.)
Parent Empowerment Act: Authorizes parents of certain low
achieving schools to petition, as specified, for the
implementation of one of five specific intervention models: 1)
Transformation model; 2) Turnaround model; 3) Restart model; 4)
School closure; and, 5) Alternative governance pursuant to the
federal No Child Left Behind Act
(EC � 53202 and 20 United States Code Section 6301, Section
1116(b)(8)(B)(v))
Unsafe Schools: The Unsafe School Choice Option (USCO) (section
9532 of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) of
1965, as amended by the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001(NCLB))
requires that each state receiving funds under the ESEA
establish and implement a statewide policy requiring that
students attending a persistently dangerous public elementary or
secondary school, or students who become victims of a violent
criminal offense while in or on the grounds of a public school
that they attend, be allowed to attend a "safe" public school.
As a condition of receiving ESEA funds, each state must certify
in writing to the Secretary of Education that the state is in
compliance with these requirements.
Local Control Accountability Plans (LCAP): As part of the 2013
Budget Act, the Legislature enacted the Local Control Funding
Formula (LCFF), which is designed to provide districts and
charter schools with the bulk of their resources in unrestricted
funding to support the basic educational program for all
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students. The LCFF includes new requirements for local planning
and accountability, including the creation of an LCAP for each
school district and charter school, which focus on improving
student outcomes in state educational priorities and ensuring
engagement of parents, students, teachers, school employees, and
the public in the local process. The LCAP must include locally
determined goals, actions, services, and expenditures of LCFF
funds for each school year in support of the state educational
priorities that are specified in statute, as well as any
additional local priorities. In adopting the LCAP, school
districts must consult with parents, students, teachers, and
other school employees.
There are 8 state priorities that must be addressed in the LCAP,
for all students and significant student subgroups in a school
district and at each school: 1) Williams settlement issues; 2)
implementation of academic content standards; 3) parental
involvement; 4) pupil achievement; 5) pupil engagement (as
measured by attendance, graduation, and dropout data); 6) school
climate (in part measured by suspension and expulsion rates); 7)
the extent to which students have access to a broad course of
study; 8) pupil outcomes for non-state-assessed courses of
study.
Proposed Law: This bill requires the CDE to create a parent
resources website that contains information on the following
public school options, including but not limited to: a) The Open
Enrollment Act; b) school districts of choice, as specified; c)
parent empowerment options, as specified; d) schools identified
as by the State Board of Education pursuant to the USCO as part
of NCLB; and, e) charter schools.
This bill further requires the website to contain information
related to eligibility for specific public school options based
on the school and school district of residence, and that it
include relevant information to individual schools in a
searchable database.
This bill requires the website to contain school districts and
school level reports on pupil outcomes, including but not
limited to: a) standardized test scores, including, the Academic
Performance Index, Adequate Yearly Progress, Standardized
Testing and Reporting, and Measurement of Academic Performance
and Progress; b) graduation rates; and, c) school accountability
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report cards (SARCs).
This bill encourages the CDE to provide the specified
information in both English and Spanish.
Staff Comments: This bill requires the CDE to create a dedicated
parent website, with specified features that would allow parents
to more easily access information about their children's
schools, school district priorities, and enrollment options.
Certain information, such as enrollment options, is required to
be provided in a searchable database specific to the child's
residence. The CDE estimates that it would cost $150,000
(General Fund) in one-time (likely contract) costs to create a
website meeting the various requirements of this bill.
The website will need to be maintained and updated. Certain
information, such as API scores and graduation rates, is already
reported to the CDE in the SARC. Other information would have to
be sought out by the CDE, such as any changes to local
enrollment options (e.g. new charter schools established) for
each of the more than 1,000 school districts in the state or
changes to a school district's LCAP. Significant on-going staff
time, potentially up to a .5 FTE, will be required to update the
website and database for the life of the website.