memo-cpag-oct16item01 Page 1 of 6 California Practitioners Advisory Group Executive Office SBE-002 (REV. 01/2011) MEMORANDUM DATE: October 12, 2016 TO: MEMBERS, California Practitioners Advisory Group FROM: STAFF, California Department of Education SUBJECT: Potential Approaches to Using Federal Funds to Support State Priorities Summary of Key Issues The purpose of this memorandum is to present the California Practitioners Advisory Group (CPAG) with an overview of the opportunities within the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) to use federal funds to support State priorities along with several scenarios for CPAG member discussion regarding this topic. The ESSA provides California and its local educational agencies (LEAs) with new opportunities to develop coherent plans that thoughtfully utilize funds to support state priorities while meeting state and federal requirements. In its consolidated state plan, California is required to describe how the State will use federal state-level activity funds, whether and how the State will utilize various set-asides made available in the law, and how it will support LEAs to effectively and efficiently use federal and state education resources to support continuous improvement. This work should be aligned to the Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) eight State priority areas. The CPAG was presented with preliminary information regarding these opportunities in Item 4 of its June 2016 meeting. The State Board of Education (SBE) was presented with preliminary information regarding these opportunities in Item 4 of its July 2016 meeting. A more comprehensive summary of these opportunities was provided to the SBE in Item 2 of its September 2016 meeting, available on the CDE SBE Agenda for September 2016 Web page at http://www.cde.ca.gov/be/ag/ag/yr16/agenda201609.asp. In particular, Attachment 3 of the September agenda item provides a great deal of context and information on this topic and may serve as an additional resource for the CPAG and other interested parties. Available Resources California Department of Education (CDE) staff has identified several opportunities within the ESSA to leverage the priorities established by the SBE:  School Improvement: States are required to reserve seven percent of the Title I LEA subgrant allocation for school improvement activities. Funds must be awarded to LEAs or consortia of LEAs, using either a formula or competitive process, to support schools implementing comprehensive support and memo-cpag-oct16item01 Page 2 of 6 improvement activities or targeted support and improvement activities. Approximately $118.7 million is available for this purpose.  Direct Student Services: The SEA may also, after meaningful consultation with LEAs, choose to reserve three percent of the Title I LEA subgrant allocation for direct student services. Allowable LEA direct student services expenditures include participation in academic courses not otherwise available at a student's school, including advanced courses and CTE coursework; credit recovery; activities that assist students in successfully completing postsecondary level instruction (e.g., Advanced Placement and International Baccalaureate courses); personalized learning activities, which may include high-quality academic tutoring; and transportation to allow a student enrolled in a school identified for comprehensive support and improvement to transfer to another public school. Approximately $53 million would be available for this purpose.  Supporting Principals and Other School Leaders: The ESSA provides California with an opportunity to reserve three percent of the Title II LEA subgrant allocation for one or more activities to support principals or other school leaders consistent with allowable State activities. Approximately $7.2 million would be available for this purpose.  State-level Activity Funds: For Titles II–IV, there is also some discretionary funding for state-level activities. The costs associated with administration of these funds (distribution, monitoring, and providing technical assistance and support to LEAs) are included in the estimates below: o Title II, Part A: $12.6 million o Title III, Part A: $8.3 million o Title IV, Part A: $2.9 million Proposed Strategic Direction: Support Implementation of California Standards The SBE first adopted statewide academic content standards for English language arts (ELA) and mathematics in 1997. Since that time, California has been building an educational system based upon some of the most rigorous and well respected academic content standards in the nation. California’s standards-based educational system is one in which standards, curriculum, assessment, and accountability are aligned to support student attainment of the standards. Teachers and local school officials, in collaboration with families and community partners, use standards to help students achieve academic success. To better prepare California’s students for success in college, career, and life, in August 2010, the SBE voted unanimously to adopt new content standards in ELA/literacy and mathematics. New English language development standards were adopted by the SBE in November 2012, and new science standards were adopted in September 2013. Since 2010, California has been steadily supporting the transition to these new standards. memo-cpag-oct16item01 Page 3 of 6 California has approached adoption and implementation of these new standards in a deliberate and thoughtful manner, resulting in strong agreement across stakeholder groups that the standards represent the right step for our state’s students and educators. There is still much work to be done, however, to fully implement the standards. The 2016 California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress (CAASPP) test results were encouraging, with improved student achievement compared to the previous year in every grade and in every student subgroup. Yet despite this encouraging news, of the more than 3.2 million California students who participated in state testing in 2016, only 49% met or exceeded standards in ELA and only 37% met or exceeded standards in mathematics.1 To fully implement the standards, there is continuing need for many teachers to learn new pedagogical strategies and integrate formative assessments into their teaching to support the continuous improvement of their own instructional practices. This is equally true of principals, many of whom need intensive professional development to provide the new kind of leadership expected and required by the more ambitious goals for teaching and learning. In 2015, the SBE and WestEd partnered to design and conduct a survey to assess the status of statewide California standards implementation. Survey findings were compiled and made available in “California Standards Implementation: Presentation to the California State Board of Education (March 2016),” available on the West Ed Publications and Resources Web page at https://www.wested.org/resources/westedpresentation-to-the-california-state-board-of-education-march-2016/. Among the report’s key findings: educators are seeking more time to learn about the standards, especially effective instructional practices; and school leaders need to develop new knowledge and capacity about curriculum, instruction, and assessment. California must continue to build the instructional capacity of its teachers and leaders to improve educational outcomes for its students. Given this imperative, and in keeping with the equity-focused nature of the federal law, the CDE proposes to leverage ESSA resources to implement strategies and activities that:     1 Build the capacity of California educators to successfully implement state content standards; Emphasize meeting the specific, and often multiple, learning needs of diverse students, including, but not limited to, English learners, students with disabilities, foster youth, and low-income students; Focus on equity and cultural responsiveness; and Promote a professional learning culture, including effective professional learning community models. From August 24, 2016 California Department of Education News Release: Schools Chief Torlakson Reports Across-the-Board Progress Toward Career and College Readiness in CAASPP Results. Retrieved October 11, 2016 from http://www.cde.ca.gov/nr/ne/yr16/yr16rel57.asp memo-cpag-oct16item01 Page 4 of 6 Further, the structure of the ESSA consolidated state plan aims to encourage states to think comprehensively about implementation of the ESSA and leverage funding across included programs, remove “silos” between different funding streams, and support collaboration and efficiency across multiple programs. The U.S. Department of Education expressed this notion in the proposed regulations for the submission of consolidated state plans: “We seek to improve teaching and learning by encouraging greater cross-program coordination, planning, and service delivery; provide greater flexibility to State and local authorities through consolidated plans and reporting; and enhance the integration of programs under the ESEA, as amended by the ESSA, with State and local programs.” As a strategic focus of the ESSA state plan, the CDE proposes to “braid” resources to the greatest extent possible to support the effective implementation of California standards. Starting Points for Discussion In keeping with the emerging strategic direction of supporting high quality implementation of California standards with a focus on program integration and coherence, several options that California might consider as it makes decisions regarding use of ESSA funds are provided below. Example 1: California Support Network California could use a portion of the required Title I seven percent mandatory setaside and Title III state-level activity funds to establish the California Support Network (CSN). The CSN would consist of integrated support teams calibrated around common methodologies and metrics located in 11 existing regional hubs. The integrated teams would include, but not be limited to, members of CDE Title I field teams, county coordinators funded out of Title III or other federal programs, and other CDE field teams and networks currently located at the county level (e.g., early education and expanded learning). The primary goals of the CSN would include building the capacity of county offices of education (COEs) to support LEAs working to improve student performance and progress outcomes in their Title I comprehensive and targeted support schools and effective allocation of federal resources to support county-led Title I school improvement efforts in ways that are complementary and aligned to the work of the California Collaborative for Educational Excellence. Example 2: Braiding Funds to Enhance Statewide Professional Learning Infrastructure California could use a competitive grant process to leverage the three percent allowable set-aside of the Title II LEA subgrant to establish the California Leadership Initiative (CLI). This would support school leaders and principals to:    Support the implementation of state content standards; Emphasize meeting the specific, and often multiple, learning needs of diverse students, including, but not limited to, English learners, students with disabilities, foster youth, and low-income students; Focus on equity and cultural responsiveness; and memo-cpag-oct16item01 Page 5 of 6  Promote a professional learning culture, including effective professional learning community models. The SEA could also use Title II state-level activity funds to contract with an entity/entities to develop the capacity of teachers in alignment with the activities of the CLI. This model could then integrally align with school improvement activities. California could run two distinct grant competitions to award the Title I seven percent mandatory set-aside to LEAs, or consortia of LEAs, to support schools implementing comprehensive or targeted support and improvement activities. The first competition would build upon and deepen the CLI objectives outlined above to develop principals and school leaders who are well prepared with school turnaround leader competencies, ensuring that leaders in our struggling schools have the training and support they need in order to address the varied and complex challenges these schools face. The second would build upon the work with teachers to support standards implementation, going deeper with strategies needed to support diverse students in high-needs schools. Example 3: California Standards Implementation Support and Resource Management California could utilize Title II, Part A; Title III, Part A; and/or Title IV, Part A statelevel activity funds to support teachers and principals to implement the state-adopted standards by providing professional learning opportunities based on California’s curriculum frameworks and conducting research to identify resources and promising evidence-based practices used in schools successfully implementing the state-adopted standards. This research would cover educator professional development, curriculum and instruction, assessment practices, collaboration with partner agencies, or any other practices that have contributed to the successful implementation of state-adopted standards. Identified resources and practices would be shared with other state and local agencies and disseminated through Collaboration in Common, CDE Web pages, virtual or in-person conferences, and an online database tied to the Local Control and Accountability Plan evaluation rubrics statements of model practices. Discussion Questions As part of this item, staff will provide an overview of previous SBE and stakeholder discussions on the opportunities within the ESSA to use federal funds to support state priorities. The CPAG will review these options and participate in a small group activity and larger group discussion to provide recommendations to staff regarding how federal funds might be used. Specifically, CPAG members will be asked to review the starting points for discussion outlined above and respond to the following questions:  Please share your thoughts regarding the emerging strategic direction for the use of ESSA resources. What additional elements might the State consider? memo-cpag-oct16item01 Page 6 of 6  When you think of our state's vision for our children's success, what role do you see ESSA playing to further that vision?  California is working on eight state priorities. Given the central role of the California Standards, should this become the central focus of ESSA work?  Which, if any, of the described starting points most resonates with you? What specific adjustments or details might we consider in refining this proposal?  Please share your ideas regarding additional starting points the State might consider.