Asm. Julia Brownley

Existing law contains provisions that define unlawful discrimination and employment practices and establish procedures for an employee who has suffered discrimination or other unlawful practices, as defined, to file a complaint with the Fair Employment and Housing Department, or under certain circumstances, to bring a civil action against his or her employer. This bill would specify when a cause of action for unlawful discrimination or unlawful employment practice with respect to compensation accrues for determining whether a complaint was filed within statutory deadlines.

Under existing law, the State Department of Education administers the child care food program pursuant to federal law, under which food is provided to child development programs and alternative child care programs, as defined. This bill would require the Superintendent of Public Instruction to establish a pilot program at least 12 months in duration in which licensed child care centers and child day care homes selected by the department that participate in the federal Child and Adult Care Food Program shall implement certain nutrition and physical activity standards in exchange for a higher state meal reimbursement. This bill would require the State Department of Education to design and implement the pilot program, as specified. The bill would specify that its provisions shall only be implemented if the Superintendent determines that non-General Fund funding sources are available for that purpose, as specified.

Existing law authorizes only a juvenile court judicial officer to make orders regarding the administration of psychotropic medications for a dependent child or a ward who has been removed from the physical custody of his or her parent. Existing law requires court authorization except in an emergency situation, as specified, for the administration of psychotropic medication to be based on a request from a physician, indicating the reasons for the request, a description of the child's or ward's diagnosis and behavior, the expected results of the medication, and a description of any side effects of the medication. Existing law requires the officer to approve or deny the request for authorization to administer psychotropic medication, or set the matter for hearing, as specified, within 7 court days. This bill would, in a pilot project operative only until January 1, 2013, in 3 counties that are selected by the State Department of Social Services in consultation with the Judicial Council and 2 other specified entities, expand the authority of a juvenile court judicial officer to make orders regarding the administration of psychotropic medications to include a dependent child or ward who has been removed from the physical custody of his or her parent or guardian, or a child who has been removed from the physical custody of a parent or guardian pending adjudication as a dependent child. The pilot project would require the physician submitting the request for psychotropic medication to have conducted an examination of the child or ward. The pilot project would require the request to indicate additional information, including the child's medical history and a description of any clinically indicated therapy recommended for the child to participate in during the 6-month period until the next court review of the psychotropic medication. The pilot project would require the juvenile court judicial officer, before authorizing the administration of psychotropic medication, to make certain findings, including that the child's or ward's caregiver has been informed, and the child or ward has been informed in an age and developmentally appropriate manner, about the recommended medications, the anticipated benefits, the nature, degree, duration, and probability of side effects and significant risks, and any other recommended treatments, that the child or ward has been informed of the right to request a hearing, and that a plan is in place for regular monitoring of the medication, as specified. The pilot project would require a dependent child or ward to be present in court for any hearing on the request for authorization to administer psychotropic medication, except as specified. The pilot project would authorize the court to inquire about specified information in any proceeding in the juvenile court following court authorization for the administration of psychotropic medication to a child or ward. The bill would require the State Department of Social Services, after consultation with the State Department of Mental Health, to report to the Legislature regarding the pilot project before July 1, 2013, as specified. The bill would require the Judicial Council to adopt rules and forms to implement these provisions on or before July 1, 2010. These provisions would remain in effect until January 1, 2014.

Existing law provides for the regulation of health insurers by the Department of Insurance. Under existing law, a health insurer that provides maternity coverage may not restrict inpatient hospital benefits, as specified, and is required to provide notice of the maternity services coverage. This bill would require new forms for health insurance policies submitted to the department after January 1, 2010, to provide coverage for maternity services, as defined. With respect to policy forms on file with the department as of January 1, 2010, the bill would require health insurers to submit to the department, on or before March 1, 2010, revised policy forms that provide coverage for maternity services and would require insurers to include that coverage in the corresponding policies that are issued, amended, or renewed following the department's approval of the revised forms, as specified.

Existing law requires the Superintendent of Public Instruction to establish an advisory committee to advise on all appropriate matters relative to the creation of the Academic Performance Index and the implementation of the Immediate Intervention/Underperforming Schools Program and the High Achieving/Improving Schools Program. Existing law requires the committee to make recommendations to the Superintendent on the appropriateness and feasibility of a methodology for generating a measurement of academic performance by using unique pupil identifiers and annual academic achievement growth to provide a more accurate measure of a school's academic achievement growth over time. This bill would require the committee, by January 1, 2011, to make recommendations to the Superintendent for the establishment of a methodology for measuring a school's academic achievement growth and a pupil's academic achievement growth more accurately and validly over time. This bill would require the committee to consider a specified pilot study of academic growth measures in making its recommendations to the Superintendent, and that the recommendations be consistent with specified federal laws. The Superintendent would be required to immediately forward the committee's recommendations to specified state entities. This bill would provide that specific provisions of the bill would not be implemented unless and until funds are appropriated by the Legislature in the annual Budget Act or another statute.

(1) The federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) , provides $4.3 billion for the State Incentive Grant Fund (Race to the Top Fund) , which is a competitive grant program designed to encourage and reward states that are implementing specified educational objectives. The ARRA requires a Governor to apply on behalf of a state seeking a Race to the Top grant, and requires the application to include specified information. The United States Secretary of Education has issued regulations and guidelines regarding state eligibility under the Race to the Top program. This bill would state the intent of the Legislature, as well as findings and declarations of the Legislature relating to the Race to the Top program. This bill would authorize the Superintendent of Public Instruction to enter into a memorandum of understanding with a local educational agency that is consistent with the requirements established by the bill and the regulations and guidelines for the Race to the Top program. This bill would require the state plan or plans submitted to the United States Secretary of Education for the Race to the Top program to meet specified substantive and procedural requirements. The bill would also require the Department of Finance to provide appropriate policy and fiscal committees of the Legislature with a copy of the plan or plans within 10 days of submission to the United States Secretary of Education for the Race to the Top program. The Department of Finance, in conjunction with the Superintendent, would, within 30 days of receipt of any federal Race to the Top program funds, and prior to their allocation, be required to develop and submit to the appropriate policy and fiscal committees of the Legislature an expenditure plan, as specified. This bill would require the Superintendent, on or before January 1, 2011, to contract with an independent evaluator relating to the implementation of the state plan to be submitted in application for a Race to the Top Fund competitive grant award. This bill would require the Superintendent, on or before September 1, 2010, to convene a working group consisting of specified members to develop parameters of the evaluation and make specified recommendations relating to the selection of the independent evaluator. This bill would require the Superintendent, on or before June 1, 2014, to provide the final evaluation to the Legislature, the Governor, and the state board, and authorize the department to use federal Race to the Top program funds for this evaluation. This bill would provide that the evaluation provisions shall become inoperative on July 1, 2014, and as of January 1, 2015, are repealed unless a later enacted statute becomes operative, as specified. (2) The Public Schools Accountability Act of 1999 requires the Superintendent, with approval of the state board, to develop the Academic Performance Index (API) , consisting of a variety of indicators, to be used to measure the performance of schools. Existing law requires the Superintendent to develop, and the state board to adopt, expected annual percentage growth targets for all schools based on their API baseline score and prescribes a minimum percentage growth target of 5% annually. The act also establishes the Immediate Intervention/Underperforming Schools Program (IIUSP) . Schools that score below the 50th percentile on certain achievement tests are invited to participate in the program and are provided program funding. Twenty-four months after receiving IIUSP funding, a school that fails to meet its growth targets each year, but demonstrates significant growth, as determined by the state board, continues to participate in the program for an additional year and to receive funding. If a school fails to meet its growth targets each year and does not demonstrate significant growth, it is deemed a state-monitored school and the Superintendent is required to take specified actions with regard to the school. This bill would require the Superintendent to apportion federal Race to the Top program funds pursuant to a specified expenditure plan for low-achieving schools. The bill, commencing with the 2011–12 fiscal year, would require the Superintendent to apportion block grant funds based on the number of certificated personnel employed in eligible school districts that have one or more schools under their jurisdiction and charter schools, that are low-achieving, as defined. School districts and charter schools that receive funds pursuant to these provisions would be required to expend the funds for specified purposes relating to professional development for teachers, administrators, and schoolsite staff. School districts and charter schools receiving funds also would be required to annually report specified information to the State Department of Education relating to the expenditure of these funds. This bill would require the Superintendent to establish a list of persistently lowest-achieving schools, as defined, according to specified criteria. The bill, except as specified, would require the governing board of a school district, county office of education, or charter school to implement, for any school identified by the Superintendent as persistently lowest-achieving, one of four interventions for turning around lowest-achieving schools described in federal regulations and guidelines for the Race to the Top program, thereby imposing a state-mandated local program. The bill would authorize a persistently lowest-achieving school implementing specified intervention models to participate in a school-to-school partnership program by working with a mentor school that has successfully transitioned from a low-achieving school to a higher-achieving school. The regional consortia authorized under a specified statute would, using specified federal funds, be required to provide, in collaboration with the department, at a minimum, technical assistance and support to local educational agencies with one or more persistently lowest-achieving schools to assist with the implementation of the duties specified for any of the 4 interventions. This bill would require the governing board of a local educational agency, with regard to any school identified as low-achieving, as defined, but not identified as persistently lowest-achieving, as defined, which continues to fail to make adequate yearly progress under the federal Elementary and Secondary Education Act after one full school year, and where at least one-half of the parents or guardians of pupils attending the school and the elementary or middle schools that normally matriculate into a middle or high school, as applicable, sign a petition requesting the local educational agency to implement a strategy to reform that school, to (a) place that request as an item on the agenda of a regularly scheduled public hearing no later than 90 days following receipt of that request, (b) hear that agenda item at that regularly scheduled meeting, and (c) allow public testimony and comment on that agenda item. (3) Existing law requires the governing board of a school district to develop and adopt objective evaluation and assessment guidelines for certificated employees. This bill would require each participating local educational agency that executes a memorandum of understanding with the State of California pursuant to the federal Race to the Top program to have in place or establish a rigorous, transparent, and fair evaluation system for its school principals. (4) Existing law requires the Controller, in consultation with the Department of Finance and the State Department of Education, to develop a plan to review and report on financial and compliance audits. Existing law requires the Controller to propose the content of an audit guide and authorizes a supplement to the audit guide to be suggested in the audit year to address issues resulting from new legislation in that year that changes the conditions of apportionment. Existing law requires the Controller to submit the proposed content of the audit guide and any supplement to the Education Audits Appeal Panel for review and possible amendment, and requires the Education Audits Appeal Panel to adopt the audit guide and any supplement pursuant to the rulemaking procedures of the Administrative Procedure Act. This bill would require the Controller to propose, and the Education Audits Appeal Panel to adopt, a charter school supplement to the audit guide in order to provide guidance to auditors regarding which sections of the school district and county office audit guide apply to charter schools and to create specific guidance related to the unique nature of charter schools. The bill also would make conforming changes. The Charter Schools Act of 1992 (Charter Schools Act) authorizes any one or more persons to submit a petition to the governing board of a school district to establish a charter school that operates independently from the existing school district structure as a method of accomplishing specified goals. The act limits the maximum number of charter schools authorized to operate in the state each year, as specified. This bill would delete that numerical limitation. The Charter Schools Act specifies the procedures for the submission, review, and approval or denial of a petition to establish a standard or countywide charter school. The act authorizes the governing board of a school district to deny a charter petition only if the board makes written factual findings that support certain facts regarding the petition. This bill, in addition, would authorize a governing board to deny a petition to establish a standard or countywide charter school if it makes a written factual finding that other charter schools in operation for at least 3 consecutive years and operated by the petitioner have met any of the following criteria: (A) the charter school has demonstrated academic achievement equivalent to a persistently lowest-achieving school, as specified; (B) the charter schoolcompleted its first renewal cycle and was not renewed by the authorizing entity, the county board of education, or the state board, as applicable; or C) the school has had its charter revoked, and the charter was not restored by the county board of education or the state board, as applicable. The Charter Schools Act limits the duration of charters to a period not to exceed 5 years and authorizes the chartering authority to grant one or more subsequent renewals for an additional period of 5 years. The act specifies the criteria a charter school is required to meet in order to receive a renewal of its charter. Commencing January 1, 2005, or after a charter school has been in operation for 4 years, whichever date occurs later, the act requires a charter school to meet at least one of several specified criteria prior to receiving a charter renewal, including a determination by the entity that granted the charter that the academic performance of the charter school is at least equal to the academic performance of the public schools that the charter school pupils would otherwise have been required to attend, as well as the academic performance of the schools in the school district in which the charter school is located, taking into account the composition of the pupil population that is served at the charter school. This bill would delete that criterion and replace it with a criterion relating to attaining positive growth on the charter school's API score. The bill would require a chartering authority, consistent with the federal Race to the Top guidelines, to consider the degree to which a charter school serves pupil populations that are similar to local district pupil populations, especially relative to high-need pupils. The bill would prohibit a chartering authority from granting a renewal of a charter school for longer than a 3-year period if that charter school is in program improvement or if a charter school is in year 5 of program improvement, except as specified. The Charter Schools Act requires a charter petition to include a reasonably comprehensive description of the manner in which annual, independent financial audits will be conducted. The act requires a charter school to transmit a copy of its annual, independent financial audit report for the preceding fiscal year to its chartering entity, the Controller, the county superintendent of schools of the county in which the charter school is sited, except as specified, and the department by December 15 of each year. This bill would require the Controller, by December 31 of each fiscal year, to publish a directory of certified public accountants and public accountants deemed by the Controller to be qualified to conduct audits of charter schools. The bill would require each audit of a charter school to be conducted by a certified public accountant or public accountant selected by the charter school from the directory. The bill would specify that it is unlawful for a public accounting firm to provide audit services to a charter school if the lead audit partner, or coordinating audit partner, having primary responsibility for the audit, or the audit partner responsible for reviewing the audit, has performed audit services for that charter school in each of the 6 previous fiscal years, except as provided. (5) Existing law, the Leroy Greene California Assessment of Academic Achievement Act (hereafter the Greene Act) , requires the Superintendent 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. This bill would require the Superintendent to develop recommendations for the reauthorization of the statewide pupil assessment program that include a plan for transitioning to a system of high-quality assessments, as defined. This bill would require the advisory committee that is established to advise the Superintendent and the state board on specified matters relating to the Public School Performance Accountability Program to make recommendations by January 1, 2011, to the Legislature, the Governor, and the state board on, among other things, the establishment of a methodology of generating a measurement of group and individual academic performance growth by utilizing individual pupil results from a longitudinally valid achievement assessment system, as specified. The Greene Act requires the Superintendent to adopt statewide content and performance standards in the core curriculum areas of reading, writing, mathematics, history/social science, and science, as specified. The Greene Act authorizes the state board to modify any proposed content standards or performance standards prior to adoption, and to adopt content and performance standards in individual core curriculum areas as those standards are submitted to the state board. This bill would eliminate this authority and instead require the Superintendent, to develop a set of academic content standards in language arts and mathematics. The standards would be required to meet specified criteria. The Superintendent, on or before August 2, 2010, would be required to present these standards to the state board, and to present to the Governor, and the appropriate policy and fiscal committees of the Legislature, specified information relating to these standards. The state board, on or before September 1, 2010, would be required to adopt or reject the standards, as specified. The bill would require the Superintendent to participate in the Common Core State Standards Initiative consortium sponsored by the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers or any associated or related interstate collaboration to jointly develop common high-quality standards or assessments aligned with the common set of standards. The bill also would make conforming changes. Existing law makes certain provisions of that act inoperative on July 1, 2011, and repeals all of the act's provisions on January 1, 2012. The bill would make the act inoperative on July 1, 2012, and would repeal the act as of January 1, 2013, except specified provisions, which would become inoperative on July 1, 2016, and would be repealed as of January 1, 2017. By extending the time period during which school districts are required to perform various duties related to the administration of achievement tests, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program. (6) The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. This bill would provide that, if the Commission on State Mandates determines that the bill contains costs mandated by the state, reimbursement for those costs shall be made pursuant to these statutory provisions.

(1) The Education Data and Information Act of 2008 requires the State Chief Information Officer to convene a working group representing specified governmental entities that collect, report, or use individual pupil education data to create a strategic plan to link education data systems and to accomplish objectives relating to the accessibility of education data. This bill, in addition, would authorize the State Department of Education, the University of California, the California State University, the Chancellor of the California Community Colleges, the Commission on Teacher Credentialing, the Employment Development Department, and the California School Information Services to enter into interagency agreements in order to facilitate specified objectives regarding the implementation of a longitudinal education data system and the transfer of education data. (2) Existing law establishes the Commission on Teacher Credentialing to, among other things, establish professional standards and procedures for the issuance and renewal of teaching and services credentials. This bill would establish the Science, Technology, Engineering, Math, and Career Technical Education Educator Credentialing Program for purposes of providing alternative routes to credentialing in accordance with the guidelines for the federal Race to the Top Fund, and would require the commission, together with the Committee on Accreditation, to develop a process to authorize additional high-quality alternative route educator preparation programs provided by school districts, county offices of education, community-based organizations, and nongovernmental organizations. The bill would authorize the commission to assess a fee on community-based and nongovernmental organizations that are seeking approval to participate in the program. (3) Federal law, the federal Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) , requires schools and educational agencies receiving federal financial assistance to comply with specified provisions regarding the release of pupil data. State law prescribes additional rules relating to the authorized release of pupil data. This bill would authorize the department, to the extent permissible under FERPA and specified state law, and commencing July 1, 2010, to conduct pupil data management on behalf of local educational agencies. The bill would require the department to establish, no earlier than July 1, 2010, an education data team to act as an institutional review board to review and respond to all requests for pupil data, as specified. The bill would make the department responsible for data management decisions for data under its jurisdiction and make the department and a local educational agency jointly liable for any data management decisions in which the department and the local educational agency participate jointly, as specified. The bill would require the department to develop appropriate policies and procedures for the education data team by July 1, 2010, that includes fees or charges that shall be imposed upon research applicants, as specified. The bill would require the department to perform the duties specified in these provisions with its existing resources. The bill would make these provisions inoperative on July 1, 2013, and repeal them on January 1, 2014. (4) Existing law requires the Superintendent of Public Instruction to establish an advisory committee to advise on all appropriate matters relative to the creation of the Academic Performance Index and the implementation of the Immediate Intervention/Underperforming Schools Program and the High Achieving/Improving Schools Program. This bill would require the Superintendent and the state board, in consultation with the advisory committee, by July 1, 2013, to make recommendations to the Legislature and the Governor on, among other things, the establishment of a methodology for generating a measurement of group and individual academic performance growth by using individual pupil results from a longitudinally valid achievement assessment system. (5) The federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) , provides $4.3 billion for the State Incentive Grant Fund (Race to the Top Fund) , which is a competitive grant program designed to encourage and reward states that are implementing specified educational objectives. The ARRA requires a Governor to apply on behalf of a state seeking a Race to the Top grant, and requires the application to include specified information. The United States Secretary of Education has issued regulations and guidelines regarding state eligibility under the Race to the Top program. This bill would state the Legislature's intent to implement education reforms to, among other things, ensure that California is positioned to be successful in the Race to the Top competition. This bill would authorize the Superintendent and the President of the State Board of Education to enter into a memorandum of understanding with a local educational agency for the purposes of implementing the Race to the Top program. The bill would require the Governor, the Superintendent, and the state board, in collaboration with participating local educational agencies, as necessary, to develop a high-quality plan or plans to submit as part of an application for federal Race to the Top funds that includes specified elements. The bill would require the Department of Finance, concurrent with the submission of the plan to the Attorney General, to provide the appropriate policy and fiscal committees of both houses of the Legislature with a copy of the plan or plans. The bill would require the Superintendent, on or before January 1, 2011, to contract with an independent evaluator relating to the implementation of the state plan. The bill would require the Superintendent, on or before June 1, 2014, to provide the final evaluation to the Legislature, the Governor, and the state board, and require the department to use federal Race to the Top program funds for this evaluation. This bill would require the Superintendent and the state board to establish a list of low-achieving schools and persistently lowest-achieving schools, as defined, according to specific criteria. The bill would require the Superintendent to notify the governing board of a school district, county superintendent of schools, or the governing body of a charter school or its equivalent, that one or more of the schools in its jurisdiction have been identified as a persistently lowest-achieving school. The bill, except as specified, would require the governing board of a school district, county office of education, or the governing body of a charter school or its equivalent to implement, for any school identified by the Superintendent as persistently lowest-achieving, one of four interventions for turning around lowest-achieving schools described in federal regulations and guidelines for the Race to the Top program, thereby imposing a state-mandated local program. The bill would authorize a persistently lowest-achieving school implementing specified intervention models to participate in a school-to-school partnership program by working with a mentor school that has successfully transitioned from a low-achieving school to a higher-achieving school. (6) Existing law establishes the California Education Information System, which consists of the California Longitudinal Pupil Achievement Data System, known as CALPADS, and the California Longitudinal Teacher Integrated Data System, known as CALTIDES. This bill would require CALPADS to be used to report data pursuant to specified federal programs, and would authorize data in the California Education Information System to be used by local educational agencies for purposes of evaluating teachers and administrators and making employment decisions, if those decisions comply with specified provisions of law. (7) Existing law, the Leroy Greene California Assessment of Academic Achievement Act (hereafter the Greene Act) , requires the Superintendent 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. This bill would express the intent of the Legislature that the reauthorization of the statewide pupil assessment program include specified elements, including a plan for transitioning to a system of high-quality assessments, as defined in the federal Race to the Top guidelines and regulations. The bill would establish the Academic Content Standards Commission, consisting of 12 appointed members, as specified. The commission would be required to develop academic content standards in language arts and mathematics, and would be required, on or before July 15, 2010, to present its recommended academic content standards to the state board. The bill would require the state board, on or before August 2, 2010, to adopt or reject the academic content standards, and would also require the Superintendent and the state board to present specified information to the Governor and appropriate policy and fiscal committees of the Legislature. This bill would exempt instructional materials adopted pursuant to those provisions from specified requirements relating to the approval and adoption of basic instructional materials by the state board. This bill would require the Superintendent, the state board, and any other entity or individual designated by the Governor to participate in the Common Core State Standards Initiative consortium sponsored by the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers or any associated or related interstate collaboration to jointly develop common high-quality standards or assessments aligned with the common set of standards. Existing law makes certain provisions of the Greene Act inoperative on July 1, 2011, and repeals all of the act's provisions on January 1, 2012. This bill would make the act inoperative on July 1, 2013, and would repeal the act as of January 1, 2014. By extending the time period during which school districts are required to perform various duties relating to the administration of achievement tests, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program. (8) Existing law requires the State Department of Education under CALPADS to contract for the development of proposals that will provide for the retention and analysis of longitudinal pupil achievement data. Existing law requires local educational agencies to retain individual pupil records for each test taker, including other data elements deemed necessary by the Superintendent, with approval of the state board, to comply with federal reporting requirements delineated in the federal Elementary and Secondary Education Act. This bill would require local educational agencies to also retain other data elements deemed necessary by the Superintendent, with the approval of the state board, to comply with programs implemented pursuant to specified provisions of federal law, subject to the submission of an expenditure plan to the Department of Finance, as specified. (9) Existing law requires the director of the Employment Development Department to permit the use of any information in his or her possession to the extent necessary for specified purposes. The bill would authorize the State Department of Education, the University of California, the California State University, and the Chancellor of the California Community Colleges to obtain quarterly wage data on students in order to meet the requirements of the federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, to the extent permitted by federal law. (10) The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. This bill would provide that, if the Commission on State Mandates determines that the bill contains costs mandated by the state, reimbursement for those costs shall be made pursuant to these statutory provisions. (11) This bill would provide that it shall become operative only if SB 4 of the 5th Extraordinary Session is also enacted and becomes operative.

Existing law establishes the Medi-Cal program, administered by the State Department of Health Care Services, under which basic health care services are provided to qualified low-income persons. The Medi-Cal program is partially governed and funded by federal Medicaid provisions. Existing law, subject to the receipt of federal financial participation, requires the department to adopt a federal option under which any employed individual with a disability who meets specified income and resource requirements, shall be eligible for benefits under the Medi-Cal program, subject to the payment of premiums. This bill would, to the extent that federal financial participation is available, authorize an individual who is otherwise eligible under this program but who is temporarily unemployed to elect to remain on Medi-Cal pursuant to these provisions for a period up to 26 weeks, as provided. This bill would also provide additional resource exemptions in determining Medi-Cal eligibility under these provisions. The bill would extend specified resource exemptions to apply for the beneficiary under any other Medi-Cal program under which the beneficiary later becomes eligible for medical assistance where that eligibility is based on age, blindness, or disability. This bill would make its provisions operative 30 days after the date that the increase in the state's federal medical assistance percentage (FMAP) pursuant to the federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) is no longer available. Existing law requires individuals who are eligible for Medi-Cal benefits pursuant to these provisions to be subject to premiums that are determined by a sliding scale that is based on countable income, as provided. This bill, not later than 90 days after the operative date specified above, would instead require each individual to pay a monthly premium that is equal to 5% of his or her individual or spousal countable income, as described, except that the premium cannot fall below or exceed a specified minimum and maximum premium payment, as provided. The bill would require the above-described provisions to be implemented only to the extent that federal financial participation is available, and only to the extent that the department seeks and obtains approval of all necessary state plan amendments. Because counties are required to make Medi-Cal eligibility determinations and this bill would extend the expansion of Medi-Cal eligibility, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program. The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. This bill would provide that, if the Commission on State Mandates determines that the bill contains costs mandated by the state, reimbursement for those costs shall be made pursuant to these statutory provisions.

The California Stem Cell Research and Cures Act, an initiative measure approved by the voters at the November 2, 2004, general election (Proposition 71) , establishes the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) , the purpose of which is, among other things, to make grants and loans for stem cell research, for research facilities, and for other vital research opportunities to realize therapies, protocols, and medical procedures that will result in the cure for, or substantial mitigation of, diseases and injuries. This bill would create the California Stem Cell and Biotechnology Education and Workforce Development Act of 2009 to establish stem cell and biotechnology education and workforce development as a state priority and to promote stronger links among industry sectors, the CIRM, and California public schools. The bill would require the State Department of Education to post certain information on its Internet Web site, including the CIRM model curriculum on stem cell science, and to communicate to science teachers and school districts the availability of this curriculum.

(1) Existing law requires the county superintendent of schools to determine a revenue limit for each school district in the county pursuant to a specified formula based on the base revenue limit of the school district for the prior year, adjusted for inflation, and the average daily attendance for the entire school district. This bill would require the base revenue limit for each school district for the 2011–12 fiscal year to include an adjustment computed as specified. The bill would require the Superintendent of Public Instruction to calculate an add-on for each school district, as specified. The bill would require the Superintendent to calculate and apportion for each basic aid district, as defined, an amount equal to the amount computed pursuant to the provision referenced in (4) below. (2) Existing law specifies that the revenue limit for the Newport-Mesa Unified School District will not include certain amounts that were not received by the district due to bankruptcy proceedings initiated by the County of Orange. This bill would provide that these provisions would remain in effect only until July 1, 2010. (3) Existing law creates the Santa Cruz High School attendance area, a program for middle school options to eliminate revenue limit inequities. This bill would provide that these provisions would remain in effect only until July 1, 2010. (4) Under existing law, in the computation of its revenue limit for the current fiscal year, a school district may add the amount computed in the preceding fiscal year for the Meals for Needy Pupils program. This bill would provide that these provisions would remain in effect only until July 1, 2010. (5) Existing law provides a revenue limit adjustment for a school district or county office of education that offers a minimum beginning teacher salary. This bill would recast and revise these provisions to generally delete their application to school districts as of July 1, 2010. (6) Existing law establishes the Jack O'Connell Beginning-Teacher Salary Incentive Program, under which a county superintendent of schools, or the county board of education, may increase the salary for certain teachers on its adopted certificated employee salary schedule, as specified. If a school district elects to meet specified requirements, it is eligible to receive an incentive amount. This bill would recast and revise these provisions to generally delete their application to school districts as of July 1, 2010.