February 12, 2002

Members of the Joint Committee:

My name is Phillip Escamilla I am here today representing CSBA—the California School Boards Association. I am a fully-credentialed former teacher who has taught in public schools. I have three main points I would like to address with you today with regard to the Professional Personnel Development Report: Articulation of Roles, District Autonomy in Hiring, and Career Ladders and Professional Development for Educators.

Articulation of Roles 

The first issue I would like to address is articulation of roles. The Master Plan must clearly articulate the roles of the state entities, including the Department of Education, the Commission on Teacher Credentialing, public and private higher education institutions, and districts in long-range planning for the recruitment and retention of teachers and administrators, and must identify such planning as one of the top priorities for the state. We believe that the report does an excellent job of this.

The report recommends the forging of voluntary regional partnerships to provide program coordination, evaluation, monitoring, and intervention at the local level. Specific examples of how regional partnerships would function are given. The idea holds promise, provided that such partnerships would be voluntary, but more detail is needed about the structure and authority of these partnerships, particularly with regard to the evaluation, monitoring, and intervention tasks described. The report suggests that a regional partnership "could intervene…to help districts reduce the number of emergency permits it uses," but the trigger for such intervention is not clear.

District Autonomy in Hiring 

The second issue I would like to address is district autonomy in local hiring decisions, which must be protected, particularly with state-level initiatives designed to reduce or eliminate the number of non-credentialed teachers in districts with low-performing or hard-to-staff schools. CSBA agrees with the report when it states that there is a need to ensure that all teachers are adequately prepared, and with the report’s recommendation that the state should "conduct systematic studies about the effectiveness of all classroom personnel, including emergency permit holders." However, the report goes on to say that research should examine "whether some districts may be intentionally hiring emergency permit teachers over fully qualified credential holders in order to cut personnel costs." Fortunately, we already have the answer to this question, and it is a resounding no.

There have been legislative proposals at the state level, and there is now federal law giving California districts a deadline for eliminating emergency permits. The report lists a series of "short-term" strategies that would reduce the number of credentialed teachers in the classroom. We would suggest to you that we already have short-term strategies in place. For example, we would agree with report where it states that pre-internships are an effective short-term strategy. Additional short-term strategies, however, should be put on hold pending successful implementation of current reforms. For instance, low performing schools are utilizing state-level initiatives such as the Teaching as a Priority (TAP) Block Grant Program, the Governor’s Teaching Fellowship Program, and alternative routes to certification in order to recruit and train credentialed teachers. But the TAP program has only been around for a couple of years, and implementation for this year, as you know, has been delayed. More time is needed to assess the impact of current efforts before new short-term strategies are created. 

Career Ladders and Professional Development for Educators

Finally, the report’s recommendations with regard to professional development and career ladders are very sound. Structures that allow veteran teachers and administrators to serve as instructional leaders address the professional needs of beginning and veteran teachers alike, and most importantly, address the learning needs of students.