AB 812: English proficiency: Los Angeles Unified School District’s Academic English Mastery Program: evaluation.
- Session Year: 2015-2016
- House: Assembly
- Latest Version Date: 2015-05-06
Existing law requires the State Department of Education, with the approval of the State Board of Education, to establish procedures for conducting an assessment of pupils who are English learners in order to determine the level of English proficiency. Existing law requires each school district that has one or more pupils who are English learners, to assess the English language development of each pupil. Existing law requires this assessment to be conducted upon initial enrollment, and annually thereafter, during a period determined by the Superintendent of Public Instruction and the state board.
This bill would, notwithstanding the above provisions, require the department, on or before September 1, 2017, to develop an assessment tool to determine the proficiency level of pupils of limited academic English proficiency, as defined, and as determined by a formal process that the bill would require the Superintendent to develop in consultation with the department and local educational agencies, as provided. The bill would require the assessment to be conducted upon a pupils initial enrollment or as early as possible after enrollment, in order to provide information to determine if the pupil is a pupil of limited academic English proficiency, and annually thereafter, during a period of time determined by the Superintendent and the state board. The bill would require the annual assessments to continue until the pupil is designated as academic English proficient, as provided. The bill would require, if a pupil is still performing at a level of limited academic English proficiency after the grade 8 Smarter Balanced Assessment System summative and interim assessments, the school district to provide targeted resources with the goal of the pupil scoring at the level of 3 or higher on the grade 11 Smarter Balanced Assessment System summative and interim assessments.
By creating new duties for a local educational agency, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program.
This bill would, contingent on the enactment of an appropriation in the annual Budget Act or related legislation for the purpose of implementing these provisions, require the Los Angeles Unified School District, in partnership with the University of California, Los Angeles Center X, to conduct an evaluation of the Los Angeles Unified School Districts Academic English Mastery Program, as specified. The bill would require the evaluation to be completed by an unspecified date and submitted to the appropriate fiscal and policy committees of the Legislature. To the extent the bill would impose additional duties on the Los Angeles Unified School District, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program.
The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement.
This bill would provide that, if the Commission on State Mandates determines that the bill contains costs mandated by the state, reimbursement for those costs shall be made pursuant to these statutory provisions.
