Parent Trigger Bill: A Summary of Major Provisions

S.5777 (Senator Grisanti)/A.7569-B (Assemblywoman Peoples-Stokes) establishes the Parent Empowerment Pilot Program (PEPP). The PEPP would apply to high-need schools, known as Persistently Lowest-Achieving schools (PLAs), which are public schools that have failed to effectively educate students for many years as determined by the Commissioner of Education. Parents in a PLAs can vote to implement one of four school improvement strategies: o The Turnaround Model: Replace the Principal and at least 50% of the teaching staff, and restructure the way teachers are hired, the instructional supports teachers receive, learning time, and school governance. o The Transformation Model: Replace the Principal, and restructure the way teachers are hired, the instructional supports teachers receive, learning time, and school governance. o The Restart Model: Convert, or close and re-open, the school as a charter school, or under the control of an education management organization. Current students would have preference to re-enroll in this school. o Closure: Close the school and enroll the students in a higher-performing school in the district. A group of parents can decide to select one of the four school improvement strategies listed above, and then attempt to collect the signatures of their fellow parents on a petition in support of implementing it. The required school improvement strategy must be indicated on the petition so that parents will clearly understand what they are being asked to support or oppose. If 51% of parents in an eligible school sign a petition, the school improvement strategy will either have to be implemented by the school district, or they will have to explain why they cannot do so and which strategy they will implement instead. If parents seek to replace the school with a charter school, all children attending the school being replaced would have enrollment preference in the school, and the school would be exempt from existing law that requires public schools converting to a charter school to maintain their union contracts. The law provides rules to make petition production, signature collection, and petition submission clear to parents. Parents may sign a petition once for each child they have enrolled in the school. The law protects parents from being harassed or otherwise influenced regarding their decision to sign a petition. Petitions are submitted to the local school district, who must verify that the signatures are valid. Districts are barred from invalidating a signature for a minor technicality. If a petition is submitted with errors, the submitters are be given one opportunity to correct them. If a school district finds that some signatures are invalid, the parents have 60 days to prove their validity. The local school district must notify the Commissioner of Education on their final decision with regard to submitted petitions: whether they will implement the recommended option, or the reason they cannot implement it. If a district rejects the recommended option, they must specify in writing why and indicate which of the other school improvement strategy they will implement instead. The State Education Department must submit a report on the impact of the PEPP to the Legislature on January 1st of the year the law is to expire. The law will expire 10 years after it takes effect. The Legislature may extend the law at that time, or allow it to lapse.