SECTIONS 8800-8802 - California Statutes

EDUCATION CODE

SECTION 8800-8802

8800. This chapter shall be known and may be cited as the Healthy
Start Support Services for Children Act.

8801. The Legislature finds and declares all of the following:
(a) A large and growing number of California's children are not
learning enough in school to prepare them for full economic, social,
and civic participation in adult life, as evidenced by the following
statistics:
(1) Each year, between 59,000 and 72,000 children are born exposed
to drugs or alcohol.
(2) Currently 360,000 children are abused or neglected, according
to the juvenile courts and county welfare departments.
(3) Each year, a substantial number of parents have their parental
rights terminated by the courts.
(4) Seventy thousand children are presently placed with foster
care because of parental abuse or neglect or delinquent behavior.
(5) Out of an average class of 30 high school sophomores, any
eight pupils are on public assistance, any four speak no English, any
eight are at least two years behind in reading and math, any three
have grown up in public housing, any seven will not graduate, any
three will be teen parents, and any seven will not be employable.
(6) Sixty-one thousand children receive mental health services
annually.
(7) One million one hundred thousand children go to bed hungry
every night.
(b) The quality of life for all Californians is affected by these
conditions. These children, and often the children they have, impose
heavy costs on taxpayers by requiring special services, income
assistance, or incarceration or institutionalization. They are a
burden on the capacity of the state's economy to produce adequate
revenues and an adequate tax base.
(c) The causes of the problems children face are complex and
interdependent. Many families, especially those affected by poverty,
fail to provide the physical, emotional, and intellectual support
needed to ensure that their children are ready for school. Many
neighborhoods and larger communities lack the resources or
organization to support children. The schools' support services
either are not effective or have not effectively serviced a large
enough percentage of at-risk children.
(d) Because children spend so much of their time at school,
schools have been increasingly asked to provide a wide range of
health and social services to children, and many have attempted to
help parents as well. The capacity of schools to undertake these
roles must be increased.
(e) However, this service capacity should not be increased through
conventional, categorical approaches. Services to children and their
families can be most effectively provided through consortia which
include schools, other health and human service providers, parents,
and community groups. Collaboration is necessary and more effective
because the goals of school and community services are
interdependent; fragmentation of existing state and local services
otherwise inhibits their effectiveness; and community-based services
offer resources and competence that schools do not have. Both the
state and counties must develop policies and incentives to improve
collaboration at the local level.
(f) Therefore, it is the intent of the Legislature that by
implementing the Healthy Start Support Services for Children Act,
children in need of assistance to overcome the barriers to healthy,
productive lives be given assistance in all of the following ways:
(1) By creating a learning environment that is optimally
responsive to the physical, emotional, and intellectual needs of each
child.
(2) By fostering interagency collaboration and communication at
the local level to more efficiently and effectively deliver human
support services to children and their families.
(3) By encouraging the full use of existing agencies, professional
personnel, and public and private funds to ensure that children are
ready and able to learn, and to prevent duplication of services and
unnecessary expenditures.
(4) By encouraging the development of a local interagency
oversight mechanism that includes a records system to evaluate cost
and effectiveness, and the development of a process of
self-assessment of those records and the way in which they are used,
to improve the effectiveness of services.

8802. For the purposes of this chapter, the following definitions
apply:
(a) "Consortium" means two or more local educational agencies.
(b) "Cooperating agency" means any federal, state, or local public
or private nonprofit agency that agrees to offer support services at
a schoolsite through a program implemented under this chapter.
(c) "Council" means the Healthy Start Support Services for
Children Program Council.
(d) "Lead agency" means the State Department of Education.
(e) "Local educational agency" means a school district or county
office of education.
(f) "Private partner" means a private business or foundation that
provides financial assistance or otherwise assists a support services
program operated under this chapter.
(g) "Qualifying school" means a school that is any of the
following:
(1) A school that maintains kindergarten or any of grades 1 to 6,
inclusive, in which 50 percent or more of the enrolled pupils either
(A) are from families that receive benefits from the Aid to Families
with Dependent Children program or any successor program, have
limited English proficiency, as identified pursuant to Section 52163,
or both, or (B) are eligible to receive free or reduced-price meals
under Section 49552.
(2) A school that maintains any of grades 7 to 12, inclusive, in
which 35 percent or more of the enrolled pupils either (A) are from
families that receive benefits from the Aid to Families with
Dependent Children program or any successor program, have limited
English proficiency, as identified pursuant to Section 52163, or
both, or (B) are eligible to receive free or reduced-price meals
under Section 49552.
(3) A school that does not satisfy the criteria in paragraph (1)
or (2) but that demonstrates other factors that warrant its
consideration, including, for example, exceptional need, potential to
serve as a model program, or service to a particular target
population. No more than 10 percent of the schools that participate
in the program established by this chapter may be schools that
qualify under this paragraph. A school that receives a grant under
this paragraph shall ensure that the following pupils in that school
are given priority to receive services provided with the grant money:
(A) are from families that receive benefits from the Aid to Families
with Dependent Children program or any successor program, have
limited English proficiency, as identified pursuant to Section 52163,
or both, or (B) are eligible to receive free or reduced-price meals
under Section 49552.
(h) "Secretary" means the Secretary of Child Development and
Education.
(i) "Agency secretary" means the Secretary of the Health and
Welfare Agency.
(j) "Superintendent" means the Superintendent of Public
Instruction.
(k) "Support services" means services that will enhance the
physical, social, emotional, and intellectual development of children
and their families.