BILL ANALYSIS
SENATE COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION
Dede Alpert, Chair
1999-2000 Regular Session
BILL NO: AB 1390
AUTHOR: Havice
AMENDED: January 12, 2000
FISCAL COMM: Yes HEARING DATE: May 17, 2000
URGENCY: No CONSULTANT:Scott P. Plotkin
SUMMARY
This bill establishes the Bullying Prevention Grant Program
for grades 5 and 6, and appropriates $150,000 to the State
Department of Education for the purpose of implementing the
program.
BACKGROUND
Two major school safety acts were approved by the
Legislature in 1999. They are summarized below.
SB 334 (Alpert) - The School Safety and Violence Protection
Act
In 1999 the Legislature enacted and the Governor approved
SB 334 (Alpert; Chapter 996, Statutes of 1999), the "No
More Victims' Violence Prevention and School Safety 2000
Strategy." Contained within SB 334 were numerous
provisions relative to school safety and juvenile justice.
The school safety provisions, known as the "School Safety
Violence Protection Act," contained the following elements:
1) School safety plans
a) Requires all schools, including new schools,
to have school safety plans.
b) Requires existing plans to be reviewed every
year.
c) Requires that the status of such plans, and
their key elements, be included in the annual
school accountability report card distributed to
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parents.
d) Deletes the sunset clauses on various
provisions of the school safety plan law.
2) Requires coordination and cooperation by the
Superintendent of Public Instruction and the Attorney
General of existing school safety and violence
protection programs
a) Interagency School Safety Demonstration Act
of 1985
b) School Safety Plans Act
c) School Community Policing Act
3) Expands the school safety and violence protection
elements of support for which schools and school
districts may apply
a) Provision of counselors and other support
services.
b) Effective and accessible communication
devices.
c) In-service programs for all school staff.
d) Cooperative relationships with local law
enforcement.
e) Any other proposal that schools and school
districts design to meet the goals and objectives
of current law in providing safe schools and
violence prevention among children and youth.
4) Requires an evaluation of programs established and
funded pursuant to the Act, with annual reports to the
Legislature.
5) Requires the Superintendent to establish appropriate
rules and regulations to implement the Act.
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6) Appropriated $5 million to fund competitive grants
appropriated under the Act for grades kindergarten
through 7, inclusive.
Although Governor Davis signed SB 334, he line item-vetoed
the $5 million appropriation, so that the Act was not
implemented, thus providing no 1999-2000 fiscal year
funding for kindergarten and grades 1 to 7, inclusive.
The Carl Washington School Safety and Violence Prevention
Act
Also in 1999, AB 1113 (Florez; Chapter 51, Statutes of
1999), a trailer bill to the
1999 Budget Act, established the School Safety Violence
Protection Act
(SSVPA) for grades 8 to 12 , inclusive. An appropriation of
$100 million was
provided in the 1999 Budget Act to fund the program.
Assembly Bill 658 (Washington; Chapter 645, Statutes of
1999), subsequently
renamed the SSVPA to the "Carl Washington School Safety and
Violence
Protection Act" (CWSSVPA), authorized county offices of
education to participate
in the CWSSVPA, and appropriated $1 million for county
offices to participate.
The funds appropriated for the CWSSVPA are allocated by the
State
Superintendent of Public Instruction (SPI) to school
districts on the basis of
enrollment, and requires a minimum allocation of $5,000 for
each schoolsite, or a
minimum of $10,000 for each school district, whichever is
greater. The funds are
required to be used for one or more of the following:
1) Providing schools with personnel, including but not
limited to, licensed or certificated school
counselors, school social workers, school nurses, and
school psychologists, who are trained in conflict
resolution. Requires any law enforcement personnel
hired pursuant to this act to be a trained and sworn
peace officers.
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2) Providing effective and accessible on-campus
communication devices and other school infrastructure
needs.
3) Establishing an in-service training program for school
staff to learn to identify at-risk students, to
communicate effectively with those students, and to
refer those students to appropriate counseling.
4) Establishing cooperative arrangements with local law
enforcement agencies for appropriate school-community
relationships.
5) For any other purpose that the school or school
district determines would contribute to providing safe
schools and preventing violence among students.
ANALYSIS
This bill establishes the Bullying Prevention Grant Program
for grades 5 and 6, and appropriates $150,000 to the State
Department of Education for the purpose of implementing the
program. Specifically, this bill:
1) Establishes the Bullying Prevention Grant Program
(BPGP) for grades 5 and 6. School districts with
jurisdiction over schools maintaining grades 5 and 6
may apply to the State Department of Education (SDE)
for a grant to implement a two-year bullying
prevention program, subject to an appropriation being
made for this purpose.
2) Requires the Superintendent of Public Instruction
(SPI) to develop criteria by which grant recipients
will be selected. The SDE is to develop and maintain
guidelines for bullying prevention programs.
3) Provides that the maximum amount of a grant is $5000
for a two-year program. Grant funds are to be
expended to implement a locally designed program or to
purchase existing bullying prevention materials and
programs.
4) Appropriates $150,000 from the general Fund to the SDE
for implementation of the Bullying Prevention Grant
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Program.
STAFF COMMENTS
1) Need for the bill . In materials provided by the
author, news articles and research papers discuss at
some length the impact of bullying in school, and that
a bill such as this provides schools and school
districts with the opportunity to focus efforts to
reduce the impact of bullying in the pupil population.
2) What do we know about bullying ? In materials provided
by the author, researchers who have studied bullying
have reached the following conclusions:
a) About 10 percent to 15 percent of children
say they are regularly bullied.
b) Bullying takes place most frequently in
school.
c) At school, bullying occurs most often where
there is little or no adult supervision-on the
playground, in the hallways and cafeteria, and in
the classroom before lessons begin.
d) Most bullying is verbal rather than
physical.
e) Bullying begins in elementary school, peaks
in middle school, and falls off in high school.
It does not, however, disappear altogether.
f) Boys bully both boys and girls. Girls tend
to bully girls.
g) Although boys are more often the
perpetrators and victims of bullying, girls tend
to bully in more indirect ways, manipulating
friendships, ostracizing classmates, and
spreading malicious rumors.
h) Both bullies and onlookers tend to blame the
victims for the treatment they receive.
i) Although most victims don't look very
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different from their classmates, they are taunted
most often because of their physical appearance.
j) Boys who are chronically victimized tend to
be more passive and physically weaker than their
tormentors. In Middle school, girls who mature
early are commonly victims of harassment.
3) Is this bill necessary ? Notwithstanding the
information and research provided by the author, is a
$150,000 incentive grant program (with its
accompanying administrative requirements) necessarily
the most effective way to address this issue?
Considering the amount of money being made available
to schools through existing school safety programs, it
would seem that bullying prevention programs - along
with other important objectives and strategies -
should be among the menu of available efforts that
schools may implement as they see fit, particularly
since local collaborative efforts to determine those
needs are required for the receipt of the next round
of $100 million previously approved by this Committee
(in SB 1580, Alpert, approved unanimously on March 29,
2000).
4) Superintendent should be responsible for guidelines .
Presently, the bill provides that the State Department
of Education is to establish and maintain guidelines
for bullying prevention programs. As a technical
matter, staff recommends that this reference be
changed to the Superintendent of Public Instruction,
who is actually responsible for the rulemaking
function of the Department.
SUPPORT
Long Beach Unified School District
OPPOSITION
None received