L. A. Unified Sch. Dist. v. Superior Court of L. A. Cnty.

• Decision Date: 23 July 2014
• Docket Number: B251693
• Citation: 175 Cal.Rptr.3d 90,228 Cal.App.4th 222
• Court: California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals
• Parties: LOS ANGELES UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT et al., Petitioners, v. The SUPERIOR COURT of Los Angeles County, Respondent; Los Angeles Times Communications LLC, Real Party in Interest.

228 Cal.App.4th 222

175 Cal.Rptr.3d 90

LOS ANGELES UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT et al., Petitioners,

v.The SUPERIOR COURT of Los Angeles County, Respondent;

Los Angeles Times Communications LLC, Real Party in Interest.

B251693

Court of Appeal,

Second District, Division 8, California.

Filed July 23, 2014

See 2 Witkin, Cal. Evidence (5th ed. 2012) Witnesses, § 291 et seq.

ORIGINAL PROCEEDINGS in mandate. James C. Chalfant, Judge. Petitions granted in part and remanded. (Los Angeles County Super. Ct. No. BS139828)

Altshuler Berzon, Jeffrey B. Demain, Jonathan Weissglass, Eric P. Brown, San Francisco; Holguin, Garfield, Martinez & Quiñonez and Jesús Quiñonez, Glendale, for Petitioner United Teachers Los Angeles.

Office of the General Counsel Los Angeles Unified School District, Alexander A. Molina; Littler Mendelson, Barrett K. Green and Maggy M. Athanasious, Los Angeles, for Petitioner Los Angeles Unified School District.

No appearance for Respondent.

Los Angeles Times Communications LLC, Jeff Glasser, San Francisco; Davis Wright Tremaine, Kelli L. Sager and Rochelle L. Wilcox, Los Angeles, for Real Party in Interest.

KUSSMAN, J.^*

INTRODUCTION

When it comes to educating children, few things are more controversial than standardized tests. And few things generate more conflict than how, or even if, teachers should try to improve their students' performance on such tests. But by law, school districts must establish standards of expected pupil achievement, and teachers are evaluated and assessed in regards to their students' progress. Whatever the merits of standardized tests, they are part of the present educational environment in which students, teachers, and parents live.

The Los Angeles Unified School District (the District or LAUSD) has developed a statistical model designed to measure a teacher's effect on his or her students' performance in the California Standards Tests (CST). This model yields a result—known as an Academic Growth Over Time (AGT) score—which is derived by comparing students' actual CST scores with the scores the students were predicted to achieve based on a host of sociodemographic and other factors. These AGT scores are calculated at various levels—by individual teacher, by grade, by school, and by subject matter. The District releases most of these scores to the public. Among other things, the District releases AGT scores for over 650 schools, as well as AGT scores for every grade level and subject matter. In addition, the District has released AGT scores for individual teachers—but with their names redacted.

This writ proceeding raises the question of whether the AGT scores of each teacher, identified by name,¹ must be released under the California Public Records Act (CPRA; Gov.Code, § 6250 et seq.).² In response to a petition for writ of mandate brought by the Los Angeles Times (Times), the trial court ruled the District is required to produce these unredacted AGT scores, as well as the location codes which identify the school to which each teacher is assigned. The District and United Teachers Los Angeles (UTLA) have each filed writ petitions in this court, challenging the trial court's ruling. They claim the court erred, arguing that the unredacted AGT scores are exempt from disclosure under two sections of the CPRA—the “privacy” exemption in section 6254, subdivision (c) and the “catch-all” exemption in section 6255.

We hold that the unredacted AGT scores are exempt from disclosure under the catch-all exemption in section 6255 because the public interest served by not disclosing the teachers' names clearly outweighs the public interest served by their disclosure. Accordingly, we grant the separate petitions for writ of mandate filed by the District and UTLA to the extent they challenge the trial court's ruling requiring disclosure by name or identifying characteristics of each teacher with his or her AGT score. However, we remand to the trial court for further proceedings regarding disclosure of the location codes.

FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

1. The District's AGT Metric

Under the Stull Act (Ed.Code, § 44660 et seq.), school districts are required to establish standards of expected student achievement in each area of study, and to evaluate teacher performance as it relates to the progress of students toward reaching those standards. (See §§ 44662 & 44664 [requiring school districts to regularly evaluate and assess teacher performance and to meet with teachers who receive an unsatisfactory rating].) Working with a research center at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, and after obtaining input from various other experts and interested parties, the District has developed the AGT metric in an attempt to measure the effect of its teachers on student standardized test (i.e., CST) performance. The AGT scores are based on a “value-added” methodology and are derived by comparing students' predicted CST scores with their actual scores. The predicted score is based on students' past performance on the CST, as well as on a host of sociodemographic and other factors, such as gender, race, English language learner status, and special education status. An AGT score is assigned using a five-point scale reflecting student performance: (1) far below predicted, (2) below predicted, (3) within the predicted range, (4) above predicted, and (5) far above predicted.

Through an official website, the District makes available to the public AGT scores for individual schools, as well as for every grade within those schools. The website also provides AGT scores for each school by subject matter. Thus, for example, one can go online and see that, in the 2011–2012 school year, third grade students at a certain elementary school received a 3.7 (on the five-point scale) in math, fourth grade students at that same school received a 3.4 in math, and fifth grade students received a 4.2 in math. One can also see scores at that school broken down by gender, race, English language learner status and other variables.

2. The Times' CPRA Requests

Starting in around 2009, before the District had developed the AGT metric, the Times began submitting CPRA requests to the District to obtain various scores relating to student and teacher performance. After some back-and-forth discussion, the District ultimately complied with the Times' requests and provided student test data, along with information that would enable the Times to connect student scores to their individual teachers. Beginning in August 2010, the Times published a series of articles concerning the effectiveness of District teachers in improving student performance on standardized tests. Based on the information obtained from the District, the newspaper developed its own value-added metric to assess teacher performance. In 2010, and again in 2011, the Times published its value-added scores for thousands of individual teachers, who were identified by name.

In April 2011, the Times made another CPRA request, seeking the AGT scores for the 2009–2010 school year, the only year for which AGT scores had been prepared at that time. The District denied the request, claiming the AGT database was still in preliminary draft form and was therefore exempt from disclosure under the CPRA's “preliminary drafts” exemption. (§ 6254, subd. (a).) ³ The District noted that teacher-identifying AGT data for the 2011–2012 school year would be part of the teacher evaluation process in the future, at which time it would be exempt under the CPRA's personnel records exemption. (§ 6254, subd. (c).) Although the District denied the CPRA request, it provided some AGT data. However, it was limited to aggregate teacher scores on a school-wide basis, and individual—but anonymous—scores for teachers.⁴

In October 2011, the Times again made a CPRA request, this time seeking teacher AGT scores for the 2010–2011 school year that were being distributed to teachers that month, as well as teacher AGT scores for the 2009–2010 school year. The District responded, claiming that (1) the 2009–2010 scores were exempt from disclosure under the preliminary drafts, personnel records, and catch-all exemptions, and (2) the 2010–2011 scores were exempt under both the personnel records and catch-all exemptions.⁵ The District said it would be willing to provide teacher AGT scores for the 2010–2011 school year, but only after redacting the names of the teachers. While the additional redacted material allows one to ascertain the AGT score of “Teacher A,” it does not reveal the classroom or the school in which Teacher A works. Thus, it does not allow one to directly compare his or her score with that of “Teacher B” in a different classroom in the same (or different) school.

Finally, in August 2012, the Times submitted another CPRA request, seeking the 2011–2012 teacher AGT scores. The District denied the request, claiming disclosure was exempt under the personnel records and catch-all exemptions. It again agreed to provide teacher AGT scores with names redacted.

3. The District–UTLA Agreement

In November 2012, the District and UTLA concluded an agreement regarding the use of AGT scores and other matters relating to the evaluation of teachers. The agreement provides that “[i]ndividual AGT scores (as distinguished from the school-level AGT results) are to be used solely to give perspective and to assist in reviewing the past CST results of the teacher, and shall neither form the basis for any performance objectives/strategies nor be used in the final evaluation.” ⁶

In addition, the District–UTLA agreement contains the following provision: “Confidentiality of Individualized CST/AGT Test Results: CST/AGT scoring reports that are linked to names of individual employees shall be treated as a confidential personnel record, due in part to their use in the employee performance evaluation system. The District will defend that principle in court as the occasion arises.” ⁷

4. The Times' Lawsuit

In October 2012, the Times...