If your shoulders are sagging, SARCs may be the reason why. This month has been full of news on the SARC front. Legislators, lawyers and compliance teams have been busy. They want SARCs to succeed at informing the public. But are the steps they are taking — new laws, new policies, new rules, new regulations — making success more likely?

CSBA LAWSUIT TO RESTORE REIMBURSEMENT FUNDS FOR SARCS

In January of this year, the Commission on Mandates took away reimbursements for SARCs. This bad news may be undone if a new lawsuit proves successful The CSBA, one city, a school district and two counties are suing the Commission on State Mandates. They want to make SARC work reimbursable again. When the Commission issued its ruling in March 2006, eliminating reimbursements for SARCs all the way back to January 2005, they cited this reason: The original law which brought about SARCs in 1988 was a voter initiative and all subsequent laws about SARCs are simply expansions of the original law. Because that law was the will of the voters and not the legislature, the state has no responsibility to reimburse districts, in the opinion of the commission. The CSBA is joined in the suit with the County of Fresno, the County of Los Angeles, the City of Newport Beach, and Sweetwater Union High School District.

PUBLIC ADVOCATES LAW FIRM CHALLENGES DISTRICTS FOR SARCS MISSING IN ACTION, MISREPORTING AND MISSING TRANSLATIONS

The San Francisco law firm that helped bring the Williams lawsuit, Public Advocates, concluded their summer audit of SARCs for over 1,400 schools in 41 districts with a flurry of demand letters. Those districts they have audited have been told to get their SARCs in order or face them in court. Their findings showed SARCs published late; SARCs missing Williams related facts about teachers, textbooks and facilities; and translated versions of the SARCs missing in action. The most prevalent problem: translations missing. Read more about their legal challenges to districts from the links below.

Read the press release [PDF]

See the Report on Audit of Districts Implementation of SARC Requirements [PDF]

CDE ESTABLISHES FIRMER GUIDELINE FOR MANAGING SARC TRANSLATIONS

Two weeks after the Public Advocates press release, the CDE reaffirmed its guidelines for translating SARCs. They interpreted Ed Code Section 48985 to require that SARCs be published in full in any language spoken by 15 percent or more of the parents in a single school. These translated SARCs must be available, as English language SARCs are, on request and in written form. Rachel Perry, who heads up the SARC unit in the Office of Policy and Evaluation, added an additional precaution: translations of SARC summaries alone do not fully comply with the translation requirements outlined in the California Education Code (EC 48985).

Yet, what makes the SARC understandable for many is a summary of its findings. NCLB, in Section 1111(h), calls for SARCs to be presented in an "understandable and uniform format, and to the extent practicable, in a language that the parents can understand." The CDE has not issued a guideline, policy, or regulation on this understandability requirement for SARCs published in English or in any other language. If it is summaries that enable citizens to understand the report, they should be a welcome and necessary part of any SARC publishing program.

The most recent research on the understandability of the CDE SARC template was conducted in the summer of 2005 by UCLA law school professor Gary Blasi. That study found that the SARC fails to inform taxpayers and parents about the quality of the schools. The report is available, either in full or in summary form, from the link below.

Read the UCLA Study on the Ineffectiveness of the SARC Template

EXIT EXAM SECTION OF SARC ADDS ANOTHER VIEW OF GRADUATION RATES

This year, youll be reporting two different views of graduation rates. In addition to the four-year graduation rate for each high school, you will also need to report a graduation rate for your 2006 senior class that accounts for the effect of the California High School Exit Exam. The data definition for the new section, "Completion of High School Graduation Requirements," calls for you to calculate the following formula. In the denominator, put the number of seniors who were present in school on CBEDS Census Day. In the numerator, put the number of those seniors who satisfied all of your districts graduation requirements, and passed both portions of the high school exit exam. The data will have to be reported for every ethnic and socioeconomic subgroup, and for the senior class of 2006 as a whole.

The two views of graduation rates present a number of challenges for you in crafting your SARCs. The resulting numbers for the new section will not match the four-year graduation rate reported by the CDE. To further confuse readers, you will be reporting on different subgroups and on different school years.

THE GOVERNOR VETOES SB1510 (ALQUIST)

At the end of September, Gov. Schwarzenegger vetoed the bill that the CDE had hoped would begin reforming accountability reporting. The bill in its final form included a "hurry-up" provision requiring that SARCs for the 2007-2008 school year be published by February 1, 2008. It included removing a few data items. All these good ideas weren't sufficient for the Governor, whose veto message hinted at "... a comprehensive overhaul of the SARC so that it is more user-friendly." The Governor's message also called for "...a higher level of fiscal transparency, particularly information that identifies how much money is actually spent for direct classroom instruction...."

The response of schools chief Jack OConnell was a heated one. "Throughout this process, we invited the Governor and his staff to join these discussions. They chose not to. In spite of this my office continually provided updates .... Never once did the Governor or his staff offer suggestions or comments privately or at any of the public hearings where this measure was discussed."

The result of this veto is that the new CDE template will contain the same data elements that the prior year's SARC contained. Improvements are limited to those the State Board of Education approved in July. Legislative reform efforts now return to the beginning.

SOME MODERATE THOUGHTS ON LAWS AND COMMON SENSE

Laws have many unintended consequences. But only occasionally do laws turn into their opposite. The legislative intent for annual accountability reports was captured in the original California law: