Pupil assessment: dual language immersion programs.

Existing law, the Leroy Greene California Assessment of Academic Achievement Act (hereafter the Greene Act) , requires the Superintendent of Public Instruction to design and implement a statewide pupil assessment program and requires school districts, charter schools, and county offices of education to administer to each of its pupils in grades 2 to 11, inclusive, certain achievement tests, including a standards-based achievement test pursuant to the Standardized Testing and Reporting (STAR) Program. Existing law authorizes a school district, at its option, to administer to pupils with limited English proficiency who are enrolled in any of grades 2 to 11, inclusive, a second achievement test in their primary language. This bill would authorize the State Department of Education to make these primary language assessments available to school districts and charter schools to assess their nonlimited-English-proficient and redesignated fluent-English-proficient pupils who are enrolled in a dual language immersion program and would require a school district or charter school that chooses to administer a primary language assessment pursuant to this authority to do so at its own expense and to enter into an agreement for that purpose with the state testing contractor, subject to the approval of the department. The bill would state legislative findings and declarations regarding primary language assessments.