SB 172: Pupil testing: high school exit examination: suspension.

Existing law requires the Superintendent of Public Instruction, with the approval of the State Board of Education, to develop a high school exit examination in English language arts and mathematics in accordance with state academic content standards. Existing law requires, commencing with the 200304 school year and each school year thereafter, each pupil completing grade 12 to successfully pass the high school exit examination as a condition of receiving a diploma of graduation or a condition of graduation from high school.

This bill would suspend the administration of the high school exit examination and would remove the high school exit examination as a condition of receiving a diploma of graduation or a condition of graduation from high school for each pupil completing grade 12, for the 201516, 201617, and 201718 school years. The bill would, until July 31, 2018, require the governing board or body of a local educational agency, as defined, and the State Department of Education on behalf of state special schools, to grant a diploma of graduation from high school to any pupil who completed grade 12 in the 200304 school year or a subsequent school year and has met all applicable graduation requirements other than the passage of the high school exit examination.

Existing law establishes the California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress as the statewide system of pupil assessments, under which various assessments are required or authorized to be administered in public schools, as specified. Existing law requires the Superintendent, on or before March 1, 2016, to submit to the state board recommendations on expanding the California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress to include additional assessments, for consideration at a regularly scheduled public meeting, and to also submit those recommendations to the appropriate policy and fiscal committees of the Legislature and to the Director of Finance in accordance with specified requirements.

This bill would add a new requirement, that the Superintendent convene an advisory panel consisting of specified individuals to provide recommendations to the Superintendent on the continuation of the high school exit examination and on alternative pathways to satisfy specified high school graduation requirements, to those recommendations to be submitted by the Superintendent.