BILL ANALYSIS
AB 1454
Page A
Date of Hearing: April 25, 2007
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION
Gene Mullin, Chair
AB 1454 (Richardson) - As Amended: April 12, 2007
SUBJECT : Content Standards: periodic review
SUMMARY : Requires the Superintendent of Public Instruction to
appoint a content standards review panel for each content
subject area two years prior to the adoption of the curriculum
for each subject area. Specifically, this bill :
1)Requires that sixty percent of the members of each panel
consist of teachers nominated by subject area professional
organizations and be currently teaching each particular
subject matter in kindergarten and grades one to twelve,
inclusive.
2)Requires the SPI to ensure that teachers appointed to the
review panel represent teachers of different grade levels, and
different geographical areas of the state, and teachers of
English learners, special education, and from the state
schools for the blind and the deaf.
3)Requires the membership of each review panel to meet specified
requirements.
4)Requires each review panel to review the content standards
established in its particular subject matter, revise the
standards as the panel deems necessary, and forward the
standards to the State Board of Education to either adopt or
reject within 120 days of receipt.
5)Provides that the members of the review panels shall serve
without compensation, except for necessary travel expenses.
6)Deletes language authorizing of the SBE to modify the proposed
content and performance standards prior to adoption, and
repeals a provision stating that because these standards are
models the adoption of the standards is not subject to the
Administrative Procedure Act.
EXISTING LAW
AB 1454
Page B
1)Requires the SBE to adopt statewide academic content standards
in core curriculum areas, and permits the SBE to modify
proposed content and performance standards prior to adoption
and allows the SBE to adopt content and performance standards
in individual core curriculum areas as those standards are
submitted to the SBE.
2)States that because content and performance standards are
models, their adoption is not subject to the Administrative
Procedure Act.
FISCAL EFFECT : Unknown
COMMENTS : AB 265 (Alpert) Chapter 975, Statutes of 1995,
provided for the appointment of a Commission for the
establishment of academic content and performance standards in
the core areas of reading, writing, mathematics, history/social
science, and science. The State Board of Education (SBE)
adopted the standards in 1998 and the standards have not been
revised since their initial adoption.
The content standards are the foundation for the accountability
system, instructional materials and staff development, which are
all aligned to these standards.
In the past couple of years, there have been several legislative
proposals to revise the content standards. The bills have been
vetoed every time since 2002. The veto messages have always
claimed that the SBE has the authority to review and revise the
content standards as it deems necessary.
However, on January 11, 2005 the California Legislative Counsel
opined that "The State Board of Education does not have the
authority to revise or amend the content standards required to
be adopted by the board after their adoption." It is the view
of the Legislative Counsel that the Legislature reserved for
itself the power to decide if, when, and the process by which
the content standards should be revised or amended.
A recent editorial<1> by a former state secretary of education
and state senator, Senator Gary Hart who was one of the
originators of the standards movement declared, "Any suggestion
---------------------------
<1> Hart, Gary. "Update the state's education standards; Much
has changed since the benchmarks for students were established."
Sacramento Bee. January 21, 2007.
AB 1454
Page C
of changing the standards has been viewed as heretical by many
education leaders. But as one of the architects of this system,
I believe the time is now right to take a fresh look at what we
expect of our children."
He further asserted, "The standards for what we expect our
students to learn must be flexible enough to allow our schools
to adapt to a demanding and rapidly changing world -- they were
not meant to be chiseled in stone."
There are several valid reasons to want to review and revise
California's academic standards, and former Senator Hart points
out the following:
These measures were formulated five years before Sept.
11. Our students need exposure to concepts (and their
historical antecedents) such as terrorism, religious
fundamentalism and nuclear proliferation -- all
concepts missing in the current history/social science
content standards. In the science content area, global
warming needs to be acknowledged and the fifth-grade
standard calling on students to know all "nine"
planets ought to be revised now that Pluto is
reclassified.
We have failed to integrate career and technical
education concepts into the standards. This is a
serious deficiency and an obstacle to establishing
rigorous job skills into the mainstream curriculum. In
addition, little effort has been made to align our
standards with the University of California and
California State University systems. A national
project sponsored by the National Governors
Association and the America's Diploma Project has had
great success in assisting states with such
integration efforts.
A common complaint from educators about state
standards is that in an effort to cover so much
knowledge and so many skills, little is explored in
depth. That leads to superficial coverage,
guilt-ridden and frantic teachers who can't get
through it all, and struggling students who get left
behind. We need to be more selective and consider
differentiating among standards based upon importance.
AB 1454
Page D
The maxim "less is more" applies here -- it would
allow for more substantive coverage of crucial topics,
provide opportunities for "pacing" for struggling
students and permit some much needed curriculum
flexibility for teachers.
On January 5, 2006, Education Week released a report, "Quality
Counts: A Decade of Standards Based Education" which found that
out of the 49 states that have adopted content standards, 32
states have a regular timeline for revising those standards.
California is one of the few states that does not have a
timeline nor a process for revising its academic content
standards.
Clarification needed : The bill requires that a teacher
appointed to a review panel shall be in "good standing with his
or her school district, fellow teachers and a statewide or
national professional teaching organization." What exactly does
it mean to be in good standing? How will this be determined?
Who will assess this? Staff recommends the bill be amended to
clarify this ambiguity.
Arguments in support : The California Teachers Association
writes, "CTA believes teachers must participate in the planning,
development implementation and refinement of California's
rigorous academic content standards. CTA also believes that
teachers should have the central role in the development
definition, and implementation of curriculum, and should
comprise a majority of all committees, commissions, or panels
making or recommending decisions in this area, including content
standards review panels."
Previous legislation : SB 1367 (Karnette) of 2002, required the
State Board of Education (SBE), beginning in 2010, to provide
for the periodic review of the adopted statewide academically,
rigorous core curriculum content standards and other specified
standards through regional hearings.
AB 642 (Mullin) of 2003 required the Superintendent of Public
Instruction (SPI) to periodically review, and the state Board of
Education to modify, the state's academic content and
performance standards, commencing in 2005.
AB 2744 (Goldberg) of 2004 established a process for periodic
review and revision of the state academic content standards.
AB 1454
Page E
The three bills above were vetoed with a similar veto message
stating that the SBE has the authority to review and revise the
content standards as it deems necessary and that California has
adopted world-class academic content standards as an essential
part of its school accountability system and a review process is
unnecessary and could result in administrative activities that
yield no improvement to the academic content standards.
AB 1100 (Mullin) of 2005 established a systematic procedure to
review and, if necessary, revise the state academic content
standards. AB 1100 was held in the Assembly Appropriations
Committee.
REGISTERED SUPPORT / OPPOSITION :
Support
California Federation of Teachers
California Science Teachers Association
California Teachers Association
Opposition
None on file.
Analysis Prepared by : Marisol Avi?a / ED. / (916) 319-2087