Over the past couple of years, several bills have passed with mandates that go into effect in 2022. Some, such as the Universal Meals Program (UMP) mandate are top of mind for most schools. Others may have fallen off school leaders’ radar screens, so CSDC is offering a few reminders. Here is a list of mandate reminders:
- AB 130 (Chapter 44, Statutes of 2021) requires (among many other things) that in the 2022-23 school year, local education agencies (LEAs) including classroom-based charter schools, beginning on their first day of school in the 2022-23 school year, must offer a nutritionally adequate, School Breakfast Program (SBP)-compliant breakfast and National School Lunch Program (NSLP)-compliant lunch to all students who request a meal, free of charge each school day, regardless of their eligibility. Classroom-based LEAs participating in the NSLP/SBP and serving a population of students who are 40 percent or greater direct-certified for free/reduced lunch status as of April 1 of the 2021-22 school year per CALPADS are considered “high poverty.” The UMP requires these LEAs to participate in a federal meal “provision.” Provisions in many ways simplify the traditional operating procedures for meal eligibility while making meals available to all students and maximizing the federal reimbursement. These “provisions” include either (1) the Community Eligibility Provision(CEP) or the less common, Provision 2. (Note: According to the CDE, provisions 1 and 3 have been all but phased out in California.) Charter schools offering nonclassroom-based instruction instead must continue to comply with a pre-existing mandate to offer at least one nutritionally adequate meal for eligible students on any school day that the student is scheduled for educational activities lasting two or more hours at a school site, resource center, meeting space, or other satellite facility operated by the charter school.
- AB 132 (Chapter 144, Statutes of 2021) requires LEAs and charter schools to confirm that students enrolled in the 12th grade complete a Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) or a California Dream Act Application (CDAA) unless the student or student’s parent or guardian opts out.
- AB 367 (Chapter 367, Statutes of 2021) requires that all public schools (including charter schools) serving grades 6-12 stock their restrooms (all women’s restrooms and any all-gender restrooms, and at least one men's restroom) with an adequate supply of free menstrual products on or before the start of the 2022-23 school year. This is a substantial expansion of the prior mandate that applied only to schools serving high proportions of low-income students and required stocking 50 percent of restrooms.
- SB 328 (Chapter 328, Statutes of 2019) requires that, beginning July 1, 2022, middle schools start their “schoolday” no earlier than 8:00AM and high schools start no earlier than 8:30AM. This mandate does not apply to rural schools. The law does not define the term “rural” and CSDC presumes that schools are free to make a reasonable determination as to their status on the point. The law defines “schoolday” in this context as having “the same meaning as . . . for purposes of calculating average daily attendance in order to compute any apportionments of state funding.” This vague definition begs questions as to whether it includes “zero hours” or other non-traditional daily schedules. Since charter schools, unlike school districts, do not have a minimum statutory number of daily instructional minutes, CSDC also presumes that charter schools must make a local determination as to what constitutes a “schoolday” for their context.
