$1b in common core money comes with lots of flexibility, some strings By Kimberly Beltran Friday, June 21, 2013 California school districts will have wide discretion in spending the additional $1.25 billion in this year’s budget to help them integrate new academic content standards, but they must first adopt spending plans showing how the money will be used and follow those up with detailed expense reports to the state. The spending plans, expected to explain how each district, county office, charter or state special school will spend the money to implement the common core state standards and associated assessments, are separate from those required under Gov. Jerry Brown’s new school finance program – the Local Control Funding Formula. Both mandates, however, were adopted as part of the state’s 2013-14 budget package, approved by the Legislature June 15 and expected to be signed by Brown before the Oct. 13 deadline. The language in the budget bill on common core funding (AB 86, Sec. 85) makes clear the monies are to be used for three primary purposes: • Professional development – training teachers and administrators to deliver the standards. • Instructional materials aligned to the standards. • And the technology needed to carry out the instruction and assessments. Aside from those conditions, and the required spending plans and expense reports, districts are free to choose how to best use the funds to meet their individual needs. “The language in the statute constitutes the requirements for how [local educational agencies] spend the money; it’s exceptionally flexible and, we believe, very well targeted to the primary expenditures needed for common core implementation,” said Erin Gabel, legislative advocate for state schools chief Tom Torlakson and the California Department of Education. “[CDE] has no formal role in providing any kind of regulatory authority over how the common core block grant is supposed to be spent; it’s very clear in the statute that districts have three areas they can spend it in – professional development, instructional materials and technology,” she explained. “It’s very open to interpretation for school districts as to how to meet their needs and their priorities in those three areas.” Still, the department, according to Gabel, will issue some type of notice or template for what districts should be prepared to include in their expense reports, due to CDE on or before July 1, 2015, “including but not limited to, specific purchases made and the number of teachers, administrators, or paraprofessional educators that received professional development,” reads the bill language. “The $1.25 billion is not in law yet,” Gabel said. “Once that’s set in stone, we’ll be providing information to the field on what this expenditure report will be.” The reports will be aligned with established expense reporting processes that districts already do, said Gabel, noting “it’s not our intent to create some new process.” In terms of guidance or technical assistance in implementing the new content standards, Gabel said districts seeking information can refer to a plan created by CDE and approved by the California State Board of Education last year to help them make the transition. The Common Core State Standards Systems Implementation Plan, available on CDE’s website atcde.ca.gov/re/cc/index.asp, outlines the philosophy of and strategies for successfully integrating the new K-12 content standards. It is important to note, however, that a key accountability provision within the Local Control Funding Formula is that districts show the degree to which they have implemented the common core standards. Also, technology expenditures for the new standards implementation can include equipment and training necessary to conduct the Smarter Balanced computer-aided assessments, set to be administered in the spring of 2015. That start date remains somewhat uncertain as the legislation – AB 484 – that would implement the state’s transition to the new computer-based, common core testing has not yet passed out of the Legislature; the administration has not taken a public position on it. Gabel said she has no reason to believe the testing date will change since it was agreed upon when California joined the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium in 2011 to develop testing aligned to the common core. “We have a great amount of support for our bill, and the date that is in the bill is derived from the implementation plan for the Smarter Balanced assessments and in a memorandum of understanding that the governor and the state board and the superintendent of public instruction signed in order to be part of that consortium,” said Gabel. “The governor is a signatory on the MOU so we would hope he would continue to support the timeline that we have agreed to as a state.” Districts can expect to receive half the common core funds – distributed at an equal rate per-pupil based on prior year enrollment – in one installment near the end of August or first of September, according to Gabel. The remaining $625 million second-installment will be dispersed in November. Another article with different detail: Districts to get $1.25 billion this fall to implement Common Core June 23rd, 2013 | Add a Comment | By John Fensterwald With uncommon speed, school districts and charter schools this fall will receive substantial money they didn’t foresee coming their way a few months ago to prepare for the Common Core standards. The catch: They first have to tell the public how they plan to use it. The state budget that Gov. Jerry Brown is poised to sign includes $1.25 billion – about $200 per student, based on 2012-13 enrollment – for schools to transition to a new set of English language arts and math standards that students will be tested on in spring 2015. Pressed by districts needing all the help they can get, Brown added $1 billion in his revised budget in May for the new standards, and legislative leaders negotiated an additional 25 percent – $250 million – in the budget awaiting Brown’s signature this week. “This is a strong indicator that the governor and Legislature will help districts be successful in the shift to Common Core,” said Assemblymember Susan Bonilla, D-Concord, who, as chair of the education subcommittee of the Assembly Budget Committee, fought for additional Common Core money. Districts also have other sources of money they can direct to Common Core: federal Title I money for low-income children, as well as Title II, targeted for principal and teacher training, and extra money they’ll be getting this fall under the new Local Control Funding Formula. The trailer bill, spelling out details in the budget, gives districts latitude to spend the $1.25 billion on teacher training, textbooks and materials and technology. The latter is needed for districts to offer the online, standardized Common Core tests and to begin the shift to digital learning. “We wanted to keep flexibility, because there are all levels of readiness in the state. Some are ahead of the curve,” said Bonilla. Districts will be able obtain the money in two installments, in September and then November. But first they must create a plan for it and hold two hearings: the first to present the proposal to the public, the second to vote on it. This will be sort of a trial run for the accountability plan that districts will have to write, starting in 2014, under the new Local Control Funding Formula, giving districts more flexibility to spend state education money. The state Department of Education must have districts’ plans for the Common Core spending in hand but will not vet them, said Erin Gabel, director of Government Affairs for State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson. For guidance, she suggested that districts refer to the 60-page Common Core implementation plan, with seven key objectives, that the State Department of Education completed in April. The state was more prescriptive in the late 1990s, when it adopted the California standards in math and English language arts. The state determined which textbooks districts could buy and funded curriculum training for teachers. Now, the options are wide open, and districts are free to hunt the internet for guidance from other states, like New York, that are further ahead and from organizations – like America Achieves, funded by the Gates Foundation, and Bloomberg Philanthropies – that are clearinghouses of information and lesson plans. Nonetheless, the risk is there that districts will blow the money on textbooks with overstated claims that they are Common Core aligned, or on overpriced technology. Districts will have two years to spend the money, but will receive it all this fall. The Department will report back to the Legislature next year on what districts did with the money.
Posted on: Mon, 08 Jul 2013 06:31:38 +0000
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