Federal and State Law Governing School Accountability Report Cards
Prepared by the CDE's Office of Policy and Evaluation

Requirement to Prepare Reports
Report Content and Design
Dissemination Requirements
Compliance Monitoring
Internet Sources for Legislative Information

LEGEND: Federal Law | California Law

Requirement to Prepare Reports

California Constitution, Article XVI, Public Finance, SEC. 8.5 (e): Any school district maintaining an elementary or secondary school shall develop and cause to be prepared an annual audit accounting for such funds and shall adopt a School Accountability Report Card for each school.

California Education Code Section 41302.5: For the purposes of Section 8 and Section 8.5 of Article XVI of the California Constitution, "school districts" shall include county boards of education, county superintendents of schools, and direct elementary and secondary level instructional services provided by the state, including the Diagnostic Schools for Neurologically Handicapped Children as established pursuant to Article 1 (commencing with Section 59200) of Chapter 3 of Part 32.

Public Law 107-110 Section 1111(h)(2)(A)(i): Not later than the beginning of the 2002-2003 school year, a local educational agency that receives assistance under this part shall prepare and disseminate an annual local educational agency report card.

Report Content and Design

California Education Code Section 33126 (a): The school accountability report card shall provide data by which parents can make meaningful comparisons between public schools enabling them to make informed decisions on which school to enroll their children.

California Education Code Section 33126.1 (a): The State Department of Education shall develop and recommend for adoption by the State Board of Education a standardized template intended to simplify the process for completing the school accountability report card and make the school accountability report card more meaningful to the public.

California Education Code Section 33126.1 (f): By January 1, 2001, the State Board of Education shall approve available definitions for inclusion in the template as well as a timetable for the further development of definitions and data collection procedures. By July 1, 2001, and each year thereafter, the State Board of Education shall adopt the template for the current year's school accountability report card. Definitions for all school conditions shall be included in the template by July 1, 2002.

California Education Code Section 33126.1 (f): By July 1, 2001, and each year thereafter, the State Board of Education shall adopt the template for the current year's school accountability report card.

California Education Code Section 33126.1 (b): The standardized template shall include fields for the insertion of data and information by the State Department of Education and by local educational agencies. When the template for a school is completed, it should enable parents and guardians to compare how local schools compare to other schools within that district as well as other schools in the state.

California Education Code Section 33126.1 (j): A school or school district that chooses not to utilize the standardized template adopted pursuant to this section shall report the data for its school accountability report card in a manner that is consistent with the definitions adopted pursuant to subdivision(c) of this section.

Public Law 107-110 Section 1111(h)(3): Preexisting Report Cards. A State educational agency or local educational agency that was providing public report cards on the performance of students, schools. Local educational agencies, or the state prior to the enactment of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 may use those report cards for the purpose of this subsection, so long as any such report card is modified, as needed, to contain the information required by this subsection.

Public Law 107-110 Section 1111 (h)(2)(C): A local educational agency may include in its annual local educational agency report card any other appropriate information, whether or not such information is included in the annual State report card.

Dissemination Requirements

California Education Code Section 33126.1 (l): Local educational agencies shall make these school accountability report cards available through the Internet or through paper copies.

California Education Code Section 33126 (c): It is the intent of the Legislature that schools make a concerted effort to notify parents of the purpose of the school accountability report cards, as described in this section, and ensure that all parents receive a copy of the report card; to ensure that the report cards are easy to read and understandable by parents; to ensure that local educational agencies with access to the Internet make available current copies of the report cards through the Internet; and to ensure that administrators and teachers are available to answer any questions regarding the report cards.

California Education Code Section 33126.1 (i): The State Department of Education shall maintain current Internet links with the web sites of local educational agencies to provide parents and the public with easy access to the school accountability report cards maintained on the Internet. In order to ensure the currency of these Internet links, local educational agencies that provide access to school accountability report cards through the Internet shall furnish current Uniform Resource Locators for their web sites to the State Department of Education.

Public Law 107-110 Section 1111 (h)(2) (E): Public Dissemination. The local educational agency shall , not later than the beginning of the 2002-2003 school year, unless the local educational agency has received a 1-year extension pursuant to subparagraph (A), publicly disseminate the information described in this paragraph to all schools in the school district served by the local educational agency and to all parents of students attending those schools in an understandable and uniform format and, to the extent practicable, provided in a language that the parents can understand, and make the information widely available through public means, such as posting on the Internet, distribution to the media, and distribution through public agencies, except that if a local educational agency issues a report card for all students, the local educational agency may include the information under this section as part of such report.

California Education Code Section 48985. When 15 percent or more of the pupils enrolled in a public school that provides instruction in kindergarten or any of grades 1 through 12 speak a single primary language other than English, as determined from the census data submitted to the Department of Education pursuant to Section 52164 in the preceding year, all notices, reports, statements, or records sent to the parent or guardian of any such pupil by the school or school district shall, in addition to being written in English, be written in such primary language, and may be responded to either in English or the primary language.

Compliance Monitoring

33126.1 (m): The State Department of Education shall monitor the compliance of local educational agencies with the requirements to prepare and to distribute school accountability report cards.

(Note: No citations have been found in the federal code that specifically requires the State Department of Education to monitor or ensure the dissemination of accountability reports.

Internet Sources for Legislative Information

State law governing accountability report card.

Federal law governing accountability report card.