Attempt to Fix the Open Enrollment Act Vetoed by Governor Brown

AB 47 would have addressed some flaws in the Open Enrollment Act (aka the Romero Bill) but was vetoed by Governor Brown on October 8, 2011. The Open Enrollment Act was enacted last year in the wake of legislative flurry to enact Race to the Top legislation. The Act requires the Superintendent of Public Instruction to identify a list of 1000 “low-performing” schools ranked by API scores, limits any one district’ schools on the list to 10% and exempts charters and other specified schools from the list.

During its first year of implementation in 2010-11, the list of 1000 schools included a number of high performing schools with API scores of 800 and above as well as a number of special education programs. In 2010, at least 96 of these schools requested and received a waiver from the Act’s provisions. An additional 103 low performing charter schools were excluded from the list.

AB 47 would have required a list of up to 1000 schools rather than a total of 1000 schools. It also would have excluded any school with an API over 700 or that had growth of 50 points or more from the list; and would have included charter schools but excluded special education programs.

While the bill had considerable education community support, passage of the bill was based on a clear party line vote. Perhaps the Legislature will try again next year and Governor Brown will change his mind, allowing the flaws to be fixed while maintaining the original intent of the Open Enrollment Act.

Sally Jensen Dutcher