Report 2010-119 Recommendation 1 Responses

Report 2010-119: Commission on Teacher Credentialing: Despite Delays in Discipline of Teacher Misconduct, the Division of Professional Practices Has Not Developed an Adequate Strategy or Implemented Processes That Will Safeguard Against Future Backlogs (Release Date: April 2011)

Recommendation #1 To: Teacher Credentialing, California Commission on

The Commission should seek a legal opinion from the attorney general to determine the legal authority and extent to which the committee may delegate to the division the discretionary authority to close investigations of alleged misconduct without committee review, and take all necessary steps to comply with the attorney general's advice.

Annual Follow-Up Agency Response From August 2012

The commission submitted a request to the attorney general on May 2, 2011. However, in its one-year response, the commission indicated that it was not waiting for the attorney general's opinion to begin increasing the number of cases presented to the committee. It stated that it had taken steps to increase the number of cases the committee was reviewing from 50-60 cases to 100 cases each month by May 2012 to determine if that workload was possible for the committee.

At its August 2012 meeting, the division informed the commission that since May 2011, it has been presenting all cases to the committee and that the practice was working. As a result, the commission adopted the following policy: All matters where the committee has jurisdiction to investigate shall be presented to the committee. Any exceptions to this policy shall only be made where the commission has explicitly granted staff specific authority to take such an action with sufficient clarity that the staff's action is a ministerial duty. Since this policy made the commission's request for a formal opinion from the attorney general unnecessary, it also approved the withdrawal of the request at its August 2012 meeting.

California State Auditor's Assessment of Annual Follow-Up Status: Fully Implemented

All Recommendations in 2010-119

Agency responses received after June 2013 are posted verbatim.