AN ACT Relating to an academic achievement and accountability system; amending RCW 28A.655.030, 28A.655.100, and 28A.225.270; adding new sections to chapter 28A.655 RCW; creating new sections; repealing RCW 28A.655.050; and declaring an emergency.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF WASHINGTON:

NEW SECTION. Sec. 1. INTENT. The legislature intends to continue to follow the findings and intent in RCW 28A.655.005.

Sec. 2. RCW 28A.655.030 and 1999 c 388 s 102 are each amended to read as follows:

The powers and duties of the academic achievement and accountability commission shall include, but are not limited to the following:

(1) For purposes of statewide accountability, the commission shall:

(a) Adopt and revise:

(i) Performance improvement goals in reading, writing, science, and mathematics by subject and grade level as the commission deems appropriate to improve student learning, once assessments in these subjects are required statewide((~~. The goals shall be in addition to any goals adopted in RCW 28A.655.050. The commission may also revise any goal adopted in RCW 28A.655.050~~));

(ii) Goals for dropout rates and reduction of dropout rates for middle schools, junior high schools, and high schools, once common definitions are developed;

(iii) Goals designed to accelerate the achievement of students who are disproportionately academically underachieving.

The commission shall adopt the goals by rule. However, before each goal is implemented, the commission shall present the goal to the education committees of the house of representatives and the senate for the committees' review and comment in a time frame that will permit the legislature to take statutory action on the goal if such action is deemed warranted by the legislature;

(b) Identify the scores students must achieve in order to meet the standard on the Washington assessment of student learning and determine student scores that identify levels of student performance below and beyond the standard. The commission shall set such performance standards and levels in consultation with the superintendent of public instruction and after consideration of any recommendations that may be developed by any advisory committees that may be established for this purpose;

(c) Adopt objective, systematic criteria to identify successful schools and school districts and recommend to the superintendent of public instruction schools and districts to be recognized for two types of accomplishments, student achievement and improvements in student achievement. Recognition for improvements in student achievement shall include consideration of one or more of the following accomplishments:

(i) An increase in the percent of students meeting standards. The level of achievement required for recognition may be based on the achievement goals established by the legislature under RCW 28A.655.050 and the commission under (a) of this subsection;

(ii) Positive progress on an improvement index that measures improvement in all levels of the assessment; and

(iii) Improvements despite challenges such as high levels of mobility, poverty, English as a second language learners, and large numbers of students in special populations as measured by either the percent of students meeting the standard, or the improvement index.

When determining the baseline year or years for recognizing individual schools, the commission may use the assessment results from the initial years the assessments were administered, if doing so with individual schools would be appropriate;

(d) Adopt objective, systematic criteria to identify schools and school districts in need of focused assistance ((~~and those in which~~)) due to significant numbers of students persistently failing to meet state standards. In its deliberations, the commission shall ((~~consider the use of all~~)) use the statewide mandated criterion-referenced and norm-referenced standardized tests as follows:

(i) Beginning in 2001, the reading and math assessments at the elementary school level;

(ii) Beginning in 2004, the reading and math assessments at the elementary, middle or junior high and high school levels;

(e) Identify schools and school districts in which state intervention ((~~measures~~)) strategies will be needed ((~~and a range of appropriate intervention strategies~~)), beginning no earlier than ((~~June 30, 2001, and after the legislature has authorized a set of intervention strategies~~)) November 1, 2002. Beginning no earlier than ((~~June 30, 2001, and after the legislature has authorized a set of intervention strategies, at the request of~~)) November 1, 2002, the superintendent of public instruction may recommend and the commission((,)) may approve that the superintendent shall intervene in the school or school district and ((~~take corrective actions. This chapter does not provide additional authority for the commission or the superintendent of public instruction to intervene in a school or school district~~)) implement state intervention strategies;

(f) Identify performance incentive systems that have improved or have the potential to improve student achievement;

(g) Annually review the assessment reporting system to ensure fairness, accuracy, timeliness, and equity of opportunity, especially with regard to schools with special circumstances and unique populations of students, and ((~~a recommendation~~)) recommend to the superintendent of public instruction ((of)) any improvements needed to the system;

(h) Annually report by December 1st to the legislature, the governor, the superintendent of public instruction, and the state board of education on the progress, findings, and recommendations of the commission. The report may include recommendations of actions to help improve student achievement;

(i) By December 1, 2000, and by December 1st annually thereafter, report to the education committees of the house of representatives and the senate on the progress that has been made in achieving the reading goal under RCW 28A.655.050 and any additional goals adopted by the commission;

(j) Coordinate its activities with the state board of education and the office of the superintendent of public instruction;

(k) Seek advice from the public and all interested educational organizations in the conduct of its work; ((~~and~~))

(l) Establish advisory committees, which may include persons who are not members of the commission; and

(m) Develop and analyze any data or information necessary to perform its accountability responsibilities;

(2) Holding meetings and public hearings, which may include regional meetings and hearings;

(3) Hiring necessary staff and determining the staff's duties and compensation. However, the office of the superintendent of public instruction shall provide staff support to the commission until the commission has hired its own staff, and shall provide most of the technical assistance and logistical support needed by the commission thereafter. The office of the superintendent of public instruction shall be the fiscal agent for the commission. The commission may direct the office of the superintendent of public instruction to enter into subcontracts, within the commission's resources, with school districts, teachers, higher education faculty, state agencies, business organizations, and other individuals and organizations to assist the commission in its deliberations; ((~~and~~))

(4) Receiving per diem and travel allowances as permitted under RCW 43.03.050 and 43.03.060; and

(5) Adopting the criteria and standards in subsection (1)(b), (c), and (d) of this section in accordance with RCW 34.05.010(16) and the procedures in RCW 34.05.310 through 34.05.395. The commission shall seek review and comment from the education committees of the house of representatives and senate before adoption.

Sec. 3. RCW 28A.655.100 and 1999 c 388 s 302 are each amended to read as follows:

Each school district board of directors shall adopt and revise, as appropriate, district-wide and school-level plans to achieve the performance improvement goals under RCW 28A.655.030 and shall:

(1)(a) Annually report to parents and to the community in a public meeting and annually report in writing the following information:

(i) District-wide and school-level performance improvement goals;

(ii) Student performance relative to the goals; and

(iii) District-wide and school-level plans to achieve the goals, including curriculum and instruction, parental or guardian involvement, and resources available to parents and guardians to help students meet the state standards;

(b) Report annually in a news release to the local media the district's progress toward meeting the district-wide and school-level goals; and

(c) Include the school-level goals, student performance relative to the goals, and a summary of school-level plans to achieve the goals in each school's annual school performance report under RCW 28A.655.110. The district also shall include this information on the district's internet web site. The office of the superintendent of public instruction shall provide a link on its web site to the school district's web site.

(2) School districts in which ten or fewer students in the district or in a school in the district are eligible to be assessed in a grade level are not required to report numerical improvement goals and performance relative to the goals, but are required to report to parents and the community their plans to improve student achievement.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 4. SUPERINTENDENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION DUTIES. (1) The superintendent of public instruction, based on the criteria established by the academic achievement and accountability commission, shall annually analyze student assessment results. The analysis shall include, but need not be limited to, consideration of the levels of achievement and levels of improvement on criterion-referenced and norm-referenced assessments required to meet goals and achievement levels determined by the academic achievement and accountability commission. The purposes of the analysis shall be:

(a) To identify successful schools and school districts, based on criteria adopted by the commission under RCW 28A.655.030;

(b) To identify schools in need of focused assistance, based on criteria adopted by the commission under RCW 28A.655.030; and

(c) After November 1, 2002, to help the superintendent of public instruction identify schools and school districts in which more intensive state intervention may be needed.

(2) Annually by October 15th, based on the results of the analysis in subsection (1)(b) of this section, the superintendent of public instruction shall recommend to the commission and the commission shall determine which schools shall be prioritized as having the highest need for focused assistance.

(3) The superintendent of public instruction shall provide the commission with available data in a timely manner, including raw student data, and other information the commission deems appropriate in pursuit of the fulfillment of its responsibility to provide oversight and monitoring of the state's educational accountability system.

(4) To the extent funds are appropriated for this specific purpose, the superintendent of public instruction shall make available to schools information on models of excellence in instruction, management, capacity building, parent involvement, and other research-based strategies to improve student achievement.

(5) The superintendent of public instruction shall adopt a minimum percentile score on the statewide mandated norm-referenced standardized achievement tests to be used as follows:

(a) One criterion to determine if a school has successfully completed a performance agreement and therefore shall be released from receiving state assistance under section 7 of this act; and

(b) One criterion to determine if a school shall be released from intervention under section 7 of this act.

(6) The superintendent of public instruction shall report annually to the legislative committees on education regarding the implementation of the performance agreements and intervention plans, including any barriers to improving student learning that school districts have encountered.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 5. FOCUSED ASSISTANCE PROCESS. (1) If a school is eligible for focused assistance, annually by November 1st, the superintendent of public instruction shall notify the school district within which the school is located of such eligibility.

(2) The superintendent of public instruction, in cooperation with the school district in which the school is located, shall oversee the following process:

(a) The superintendent of public instruction or the superintendent's designee, in cooperation with the district, shall convene a team of experts to conduct an educational audit of the school. The educational audit shall include but need not be limited to:

(i) An evaluation of the things that are working well in the school and those that need reexamination and redirection;

(ii) Resources available to the school, the use of those resources, and how current funds can be used more effectively;

(iii) The relationship of the school to its local district, parents, and the community;

(iv) The curriculum and instructional materials available and the extent to which those materials are aligned with the state's essential academic learning requirements;

(v) The roles and contributions of the school's employees, and the level of experience and subject matter expertise, including endorsements, of the school's certificated employees;

(vi) The needs and characteristics of the school's students, including student mobility and poverty indicators; attendance rates; dropout and graduation rates, if applicable and available; posthigh school indicators, if applicable and available; and the percent of students in special programs;

(vii) School district management practices;

(viii) School climate and safety indicators; and

(ix) Other barriers to student learning.

(b) The superintendent of public instruction, or the superintendent's designee, shall formally present the findings of the educational audit to the school district board of directors, and shall share the results with the academic achievement and accountability commission.

(c) The school directors shall hold a public meeting to inform parents, teachers, staff, and the local community of the findings of the educational audit, and to solicit input on ways to address the issues identified.

(d) Based on the results of the educational audit and input from parents, teachers, staff, and the community, a team of school employees and the principal that is convened by the school district in cooperation with the superintendent of public instruction or the superintendent of public instruction's designee shall develop a comprehensive school improvement plan within one hundred twenty days of being notified by the superintendent of public instruction of focused assistance eligibility. The plan shall address items identified in the educational audit and shall include, but not be limited to, the following:

(i) Student performance goals and expectations;

(ii) How existing funds will be used more effectively;

(iii) How identified barriers to student learning will be addressed;

(iv) What actions are needed to assist the school;

(v) Who is responsible for implementing the specific actions in the plan;

(vi) Whether students attending the school should have the choice of transferring to other public schools in the district, and whether this choice includes free bus transportation; and

(vii) Whether waivers of state laws or local policies and agreements are needed. Waiver provisions in existence before January 1, 2001, are to be used to obtain the waivers, under an expedited decision-making process if necessary.

(e) The superintendent of public instruction, or the superintendent's designee, and the school district shall jointly negotiate the terms of a performance agreement to address the issues identified in the educational audit and to implement the school improvement plan. The agreement shall be developed in consultation with the school's staff and parents. In addition to the items addressed in the school improvement plan, the performance agreements shall include, but not be limited to, a description of:

(i) How additional focused assistance resources, if any, will be used;

(ii) What actions the district will take to assist the school;

(iii) Who is responsible for implementing the specific actions in the agreement; and

(iv) Measurable benchmarks for actions in the performance agreement with a timeline for completion.

(f) The school directors shall hold a public hearing to inform parents, teachers, staff, and the local community about the school improvement plan and the terms of the performance agreement.

(g) If the superintendent of public instruction determines that the school district is failing to complete the process in a timely fashion or is failing to conduct the process in good faith, the superintendent of public instruction shall recommend to the academic achievement and accountability commission that intervention strategies be imposed.

(h) The duration of a performance agreement shall be two school years.

(i) Before final adoption, the performance agreement shall be submitted to the academic achievement and accountability commission in a time frame that permits the commission to make recommendations for modifications to the terms of the agreement.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 6. FOCUSED ASSISTANCE OPTIONS AND ACTIONS. (1) Focused assistance, as outlined in this chapter, shall be available to a school district on behalf of an eligible school to complete an educational audit, develop a school improvement plan, and implement a performance agreement. Focused assistance for performance agreement implementation may not be provided to a school district in a given academic year unless the agreement is approved within one hundred eighty calendar days of the date the district is notified by the superintendent of public instruction of focused assistance eligibility. Assistance may be obtained from third parties, such as personnel from colleges or universities, independent contractors, statewide education organizations, and educational service districts.

(2) Focused assistance options and actions available to the school, school district, and superintendent of public instruction in a performance agreement may include, but are not limited to:

(a) Changes in the school's curriculum and instructional practices, including implementing a whole school reform model;

(b) Staff collaboration, planning, and training;

(d) Supplemental contracts subject to RCW 28A.400.200(4);

(e) Extended learning opportunities for students;

(f) Providing students attending the school with the choice of transferring to other public schools in the district;

(g) Revising school district personnel assignments;

(h) Reallocation of financial resources;

(i) Increasing fiscal flexibility at the school site;

(j) Hiring a short-term principal-teacher replacement team that would provide free time for the principal and teachers for staff collaboration, planning, and training;

(k) Restructuring of the management, budget, organization, and instructional or programmatic approaches;

(l) Any other action authorized by law that the superintendent of public instruction deems necessary to improve student learning.

(3) In a class I school district, the parent or guardian of a student in a school identified for focused assistance may enroll the student in a different public school in the district. Each class I school district shall adopt a policy allowing the automatic intradistrict release and acceptance of students from schools that are in focused assistance under this section. If the school district board of directors determines that the automatic intradistrict transfer of a student under this section is an undue hardship, the school district may appeal that intradistrict transfer to the state board of education.

(4) The superintendent of public instruction may use focused assistance funds to assist a school if the superintendent of public instruction finds that funds currently available to the school are being used effectively, or will be reallocated to be used effectively under the terms of the performance agreement.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 7. EVALUATION AND INTERVENTION. (1) The superintendent of public instruction, or the superintendent's designee, shall analyze the implementation of a performance agreement after the agreement has been in effect for one year. Upon completion, the superintendent shall provide the analysis to the school district and academic achievement and accountability commission. The focus of the analysis shall be the degree to which implementation benchmarks and timelines in the agreement have been met.

(2) Two years after a performance agreement is approved, the superintendent of public instruction shall evaluate progress on the performance agreement implementation benchmarks and the degree to which students in the school have met or exceeded the student performance expectations described in the agreement. The superintendent of public instruction shall provide the analysis to the school district and academic achievement and accountability commission.

(3) Based on the results of the evaluation, the superintendent of public instruction shall recommend, and the commission shall approve, whether the performance agreement shall be:

(a) Ended because the agreement was successfully completed. An agreement is successfully completed when one of the following criteria is met:

(i) The school, for two years, has successfully met or exceeded the student performance improvement goals as established by the academic achievement and accountability commission under RCW 28A.655.030(1)(a)(i);

(ii) The school has made sufficient progress on the performance agreement; or

(iii) The school has successfully met or exceeded the minimum percentile score on the statewide mandated norm-referenced standardized achievement tests set by the superintendent of public instruction under section 4 of this act;

(b) Extended with existing or newly negotiated conditions; or

(c) Replaced with an intervention plan. The superintendent of public instruction shall recommend the implementation of an intervention plan if the superintendent finds that the school district and school are making insufficient progress in improving student learning or insufficient progress in implementation of the performance agreement.

(4) The superintendent of public instruction shall formally notify the school directors of the district of the results of the evaluation and the superintendent's recommendations to the commission.

(5) When the academic achievement and accountability commission has approved the superintendent of public instruction's recommendation to replace a performance agreement with an intervention plan:

(a) The superintendent of public instruction shall write, revise as necessary, and oversee the implementation of an intervention plan that may contain any action authorized by law that the superintendent of public instruction deems necessary to improve student learning;

(b) The school district shall implement each component of the intervention plan and report at least annually to parents, the community, the academic achievement and accountability commission, and the superintendent of public instruction on the district's progress in raising student achievement and on the implementation of the intervention plan; and

(c) The superintendent of public instruction shall recommend and the commission shall approve whether the school district shall be released from the intervention plan when any of the following criteria are met:

(i) The school, for two consecutive years, has successfully met or exceeded the student performance improvement goals as established by the academic achievement and accountability commission under RCW 28A.655.030(1)(a)(i);

(ii) The school has made sufficient progress on the intervention plan;

(iii) The school, for two consecutive years, has successfully met or exceeded the minimum percentile score on the statewide mandated norm-referenced standardized achievement tests set by the superintendent of public instruction under section 4 of this act.

(6) In a class I school district, the parent or guardian of a student in a school under intervention may enroll the student in a different public school in the district. Each class I school district shall adopt a policy allowing the automatic intradistrict release and acceptance of students from schools that are in intervention under this section. If the school district board of directors determines that the automatic intradistrict transfer of a student under this section is an undue hardship, the school district may appeal that intradistrict transfer to the state board of education.

(7) One year after a school district has been released from an intervention plan, the school district shall report to the superintendent of public instruction on the district's progress in continuing to improve student achievement.

Sec. 8. RCW 28A.225.270 and 1990 1st ex.s. c 9 s 205 are each amended to read as follows:

(1) Each school district in the state shall adopt and implement a policy allowing intradistrict enrollment options no later than June 30, 1990. Each district shall establish its own policy establishing standards on how the intradistrict enrollment options will be implemented.

(2) After the effective date of this section, each school district in the state shall amend its intradistrict enrollment policy regarding student transfers from schools in focused assistance or intervention consistent with section 6 and 7 of this act.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 9. REPORT ON INTERVENTIONS. By November 30, 2002, the academic achievement and accountability commission shall analyze and report to the governor and the legislative education committees on the intervention strategies used by other states and nations, including the success of those strategies in improving student achievement.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 10. CAPTIONS NOT LAW. Captions used in this act are not any part of the law.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 11. Sections 4 through 7 of this act are each added to chapter 28A.655 RCW.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 12. If any provision of this act or its application to any person or circumstance is held invalid, the remainder of the act or the application of the provision to other persons or circumstances is not affected.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 13. RCW 28A.655.050 (Reading goals--Mathematics goals) and 1999 c 388 s 201 & 1998 c 319 s 101 are each repealed.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 14. This act is necessary for the immediate preservation of the public peace, health, or safety, or support of the state government and its existing public institutions, and takes effect immediately.