What Does It Cost to Educate California's Students? a Professional Judgement Approach Report Appendices
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Technical Report What Does It Cost to Educate California’s Students? A Professional Judgement Approach Report Appendices Jesse Levin Iliana Brodziak de los Reyes Drew Atchison Karen Manship Melissa Arellanes Lynn Hu American Institutes for Research (AIR) September 2018 About: The Getting Down to Facts project seeks to create a common evidence base for understanding the current state of California school systems and lay the foundation for substantive conversations about what education policies should be sustained and what might be improved to ensure increased opportunity and success for all students in California in the decades ahead. Getting Down to Facts II follows approximately a decade after the first Getting Down to Facts effort in 2007. This technical report is one of 36 in the set of Getting Down to Facts II studies that cover four main areas related to state education policy: student success, governance, personnel, and funding. What Does It Cost to Educate California’s Students? A Professional Judgement Approach Report Appendices Jesse Levin Iliana Brodziak de los Reyes Drew Atchison Karen Manship Melissa Arellanes Lynn Hu American Institutes for Research List of Appendices Appendix A. Professional Judgement Panel General Instructions.................................................. 1 Appendix B. Professional Judgement Panel. Task Instructions .................................................... 12 Appendix C. School Resource Profiles .......................................................................................... 29 Appendix D. Suggested Reading for Professional Judgement Panelists ....................................... 32 Appendix E. Professional Judgement Panelist Information ....................................................... 113 Appendix F. Program Design Documents ................................................................................... 122 Appendix G. Professional Judgement Panelist Cost Estimates ................................................... 212 Appendix H. Descriptive Statistics .............................................................................................. 219 i | Getting Down to Facts II Appendix A. Professional Judgment Panel General Instructions Getting Down to Facts II California Adequacy Study Professional Judgment Panel General Instructions Document A Please read this introduction in its entirety before beginning work on Tasks 1-9 Introduction You have been selected to serve on one of two professional judgment panels (PJPs) that will contribute to the reexamination of the California school funding formula. You have been nominated and selected to serve on one of these PJPs because of your unique knowledge, skills, and perspective as a California educator. Each PJP will be asked to carry out a set of tasks over the course of this two-and-a-half-day meeting. The purpose of this document is to provide a general overview of the purpose of PJP meetings, the nature of the activities, the assumptions to be made in your work, and the resources to which you will have access to accomplish the tasks. Statement of Purpose The ultimate purpose of this work is to help us estimate the cost of providing an adequate education for all public school students in California. There are four components required to achieve this objective: 1. Define adequacy. First, we are providing the PJPs with a Goals Statement (Exhibit A.1) that defines what is meant by the term “adequate education. ” The Goals Statement incorporates four state accountability measures described in the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) and access to California Content Standards. 2. Design programs. Second, we are asking each PJP to work independently to design educational programs at the elementary, middle, and high school levels that, in the professional judgment of the panel members, will provide an adequate opportunity for students in schools with varying demographics to have access to the learning opportunities specified in the Goals Statement (see Exhibit A.1) and to achieve the desired results. 1 | What Does It Cost to Educate California’s Students? A Professional Judgement Approach Report Appendices 3. Specify resources. Third, each PJP will be asked to specify the resources and services necessary to efficiently deliver “adequate” educational programs in public elementary, middle, and high schools in California. 4. Estimate costs. Fourth, the AIR research team will use the information provided by each PJP to estimate the cost to deliver “adequate” educational programs in each and every public school and district in the state. The charge of the PJP’s is to complete components 2 and 3, above. Please note that we are not asking PJPs to create a “one size fits all” model to be implemented in all California public schools. Rather, we are asking panels to design instructional programs and specify the resources that they believe will deliver the desired results as efficiently as possible (i.e., at the lowest possible cost to taxpayers). These program designs and resource specifications simply provide us with a basis from which to estimate the costs of achieving the goals and to show how these estimates might be used to modify the existing school funding formula. By developing cost estimates for an adequate education from the work of two independent panels, we can measure how sensitive the cost estimates of the panels are to alternative specifications of the personnel and non-personnel resources required to deliver an adequate education. Definition of Educational Adequacy The purpose of the Goals Statement (see Exhibit A.1) is to guide the deliberations of the PJPs. This Goals Statement is based on the accountability plan that the California State Department of Education submitted under the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), which was signed into federal law in 2015 and reauthorized the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA). The Goals Statement also incorporates the California Content Standards adopted by the California State Board of Education ’s vision, mission, and goals. The Accountability System California ’s accountability system is a reflection of the belief that all local education agencies and schools should improve. It is focused on student group performance and emphasizes equity. The system has both state and local indicators. The State indicators have the following priority areas: student achievement, student engagement, and school climate. The Local indicators focus on basic services and conditions at schools, implementation of state academic standards, parent engagement, school climate, and access to a broad course of study. Regarding the access to a broad course of study, each local education agency measures its performance based on a college/career indicator to measure whether high school graduates are prepared for postsecondary education. Table 1 shows the priority area of the Local Control Funding Formula with its corresponding state or local indicator. 2 | Getting Down to Facts II Table 1. Local Control Funding Formula Priority Area and State and Local Indicators Local Control Funding State Indicators Local Indicators Formula Priority Area Basic Services and N/A Access to textbook, adequate facilities, and Conditions at schools appropriately assigned teachers (Priority 1) Implementation of N/A Annual report on progress in implementing State Academic the standards for all content areas Standards (Priority 2) Parent Engagement N/A Annual report on progress toward: (1) seeking (Priority 3) input from parents/guardians in decision making; and (2) promoting parental participation in programs Student Achievement Academic Indicator N/A (Priority 4) Student Achievement English Learner N/A (Priority 4) Progress Indicator Student Engagement Graduation Rate N/A (Priority 5) Indicator Student Engagement Chronic Absenteeism N/A (Priority 5) Indicator (not available until Fall 2018) School Climate (Priority Suspension Rate Administer a Local Climate Survey every other 6) Indicator year Access to a Broad N/A College/Career Indicator (Status Only) for the Course of Study initial release (Priority 7) Outcomes in a Broad N/A College/Career Indicator (Status Only) for the Course of Study initial release (Priority 8) N/A: Not Applicable Source: Available at https://www.cde.ca.gov/ta/ac/cm/ 3 | What Does It Cost to Educate California’s Students? A Professional Judgement Approach Report Appendices Exhibit A.1: Goals Statement Goals Statement California Department of Education Vision, Mission and Goals The State Board of Education (SBE) has set the following vision for all California students: All California students of the 21st century will attain the highest level of academic knowledge, applied learning and performance skills to ensure fulfilling personal lives and careers and contribute to civic and economic progress in our diverse and changing democratic society. Under this framework, SBE has also defined its mission as: Create strong, effective schools that provide a wholesome learning environment through incentives that cause a high standard of student accomplishment as measured by a valid, reliable accountability system. The overarching goals of the SBE are focused on two areas: Standards and Achievement. SBE goal is to adopt and support rigorous academic content and performance standards in the four core subjects for kindergarten and grades 1 through 12. In regards to achievement, SBE goal is to ensure that all students are performing at grade level or higher, particularly in reading and math,