Did your legislator make the grade?
State lawmakers’ votes on key education issues close the loop on accountability
Winter 2012
Every student must have access to a challenging instructional program based on a strong core curriculum, reinforced by high-quality instructional materials and an accountability system that accurately reflects the performance of students, teachers, and school sites.
Fair enough; that’s the gist of CSBA’s online overview of accountability as an education issue. It’s an obligation that the association and its members proudly embrace—the reason we do what we do—and it’s the responsibility that school governance teams bear under the state constitution.
But accountability works both ways. If local schools are accountable for providing that challenging instructional system, then higher government officials must be held to account for their role in providing schools with the resources they need to discharge their duties. It’s not just a good idea, it’s the law—the state’s constitutional obligation, in fact, as CSBA’s Education Legal Alliance argues in Robles-Wong, the lawsuit contesting the state’s unfair and irrational system of financing public education. But more than money is required; school districts and county offices of education also need support, in policy and statute, that the state Legislature is—you guessed it—accountable for providing.
Lawmakers don’t work in a vacuum, however. Just as local schools rely on higher government for the resources, policies and authority to educate our children, those higher government officials rely on the experts—local governance teams—to tell them what they need. In that sense, accountability isn’t so much a two-way street as an ongoing cycle of shared responsibility.
CSBA’s Governmental Relations Department plays a crucial role in that, one informed by the association’s membership and advised by a Legislative Committee drawn from those members, under the leadership of Executive Director Vernon M. Billy and in consultation with our own legal and policy experts and allies in the advocacy community.
Assistant Executive Director for Governmental Relations Dennis Meyers and his staff work closely with the state’s 40 state senators, 80 Assembly members and the Governor’s Office to craft legislation that will empower school leaders to give our students the education they deserve. It’s complicated, delicate work, and its effectiveness hinges on the active and knowledgeable participation of local school board members who, in the words of CSBA’s Policy Platform, “represent the most fundamental element of a democratic society and are the basic embodiment of representative government,” and so are closest to the constituents to whom all public officials are accountable.
Meyers strongly encourages local governance teams to cultivate relationships with their representatives in Sacramento. (Washington too, of course, although that’s not the focus of this story—stay tuned for more on that in 2013.)
“Feeding information to legislators on a continual basis helps keep them informed on what is going on in schools and is an easy way to keep one’s name, district or county office, and issues on the legislators’ radar,” Meyers says. “Establishing and maintaining positive relationships can pay off when a particular vote is needed on a specific issue. Getting a call from a school board member on a pending bill means a lot to legislators and staff. Getting several calls from several school board members has an exponential effect.”
Meyers and his staff have resources to help coordinate those efforts and focus the power of CSBA’s vaunted “army of 5,000” school board members when the next legislative session begins. In the mean time, though, it’s time to hold legislators accountable for their votes in the session that recently concluded.
The Governmental Relations staff has compiled a table of key floor votes on some of the most important education-related legislation of 2012. Included are the two bills CSBA sponsored—both of which passed and were signed into law—and others that the accompanying summaries explain. While no partial record can capture the full range of a lawmaker’s attitudes and actions, readers can use this data to review their legislators’ records on bills that will affect local school boards’ work in the year ahead.
—Brian Taylor
Tools
Under the Dome: Key bills
CSBA’s Governmental Relations Department identified 13 key bills affecting K-12 education from the past year. The bill numbers, authors, titles and summaries below also include CSBA’s position and the legislative advocate on staff who worked each bill.
AB 5 (Fuentes): Teacher evaluations
Would have expanded the scope of bargaining, requiring union agreement on standards for student achievement and teacher evaluation criteria, and imposing a costly unfunded mandate. Would have required districts to adopt a best-practices teacher evaluation system, to be implemented through bargaining.
CSBA position: Oppose unless amended | Advocate: Rivas
AB 340 (Furutani): Public employee retirement
Changes numerous pension provisions for new public employees.
CSBA position: Support | Advocate: Rivas
AB 360 (Brownley): Charter schools
CSBA-sponsored bill would have applied the Ralph M. Brown Act to charter schools.
CSBA position: Sponsor | Advocate: Rivas
AB 1246 (Brownley): Instructional materials
Revises the instructional materials adoption process for grades K-8 and authorizes use of K-8 instructional materials that are not on the state-adopted list, provided they are aligned to state-adopted standards.
CSBA position: Support | Advocate: Hoffman
AB 1719 (Fuentes): Supplemental instructional materials: English language development: mathematics
Provides for the adoption of supplemental materials for English learners aligned to the Common Core State Standards and which incorporate revised English Language Development Standards.
CSBA position: Support | Advocate: Hoffman
AB 1729 (Ammiano): Pupil rights: suspension or expulsion
Clarifies alternatives to expulsion or suspension to be used in addressing student behavioral issues.
CSBA position: Neutral | Advocate: Hoffman
AB 2242 (Dickinson): Pupils: suspension and expulsion
Would have provided that a pupil who has disrupted school activities or otherwise willfully defied the valid authority of school personnel would not be subject to an extended suspension or expulsion.
CSBA position: Oppose | Advocate: Hoffman
AB 2278 (Swanson): School districts: state administrator evaluations
CSBA-sponsored bill authorizing governing boards, after one complete fiscal year has elapsed following a school district’s acceptance of an emergency apportionment, to conduct an annual advisory evaluation of the state-appointed administrator. The evaluation is to be submitted to the governor, state Legislature, state superintendent of public instruction and the County Office Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team.
CSBA position: Sponsor | Advocate: Meyers
AB 2279 (Swanson): School district emergency apportionments: trustees
CSBA-sponsored bill shortening the term of a state-appointed trustee when a district has accepted an emergency apportionment, and the district has adequate fiscal systems and controls in place and the state superintendent of public instruction determines the district’s future compliance with an approved fiscal plan is probable. After that, and until the loan is repaid, the local county superintendent of schools is authorized to stay or rescind an action of the district’s governing board that may affect the district’s financial condition.
CSBA position: Sponsor | Advocate: Meyers
AB 2537 (Perez, V.M.): Pupil discipline: suspensions and expulsions
Removes the penalty for failure to report acts committed by pupils that were illegal and resulted in suspension and/or expulsion.
CSBA position: Neutral | Advocate: Hoffman
SB 1200 (Hancock): Academic content standards: recommended modifications
Authorizes the State Board of Education to adopt the Common Core college and career readiness standards and authorizes the review and modification of current standards for eighth-grade mathematics.
CSBA position: Support | Advocate: Hoffman
SB 1235 (Steinberg): Pupils: suspension
Would have encouraged a school district to implement either an evidence-based system of schoolwide behavioral interventions and supports or other evidence-based schoolwide strategies to address school climate at schools where the number of pupils receiving off-campus suspensions in the prior school year exceeded 25 percent of either its total enrollment or of a numerically significant pupil subgroup.
CSBA position: Neutral | Advocate: Hoffman
SB 1530 (Padilla): School employees: dismissal, suspension procedures
Would have included serious or egregious unprofessional conduct as grounds for dismissal of a permanent school employee and, where certain specified offenses were involved, would have granted an exception from the prohibition of giving notice of dismissal or suspension to such employees between May 15 and Sept. 15.
CSBA position: Support and seek amendments | Advocate: Rivas