Ed. Code, § 58500 · Chapter 3. Alternative Schools
Ed. Code, § 58500
Text — As published in the Legislative Counsel's database, tables dated October 18, 2026 (pubinfo_2025.zip)
The governing board of any school district may establish and maintain one or more alternative schools within the district.
For the purposes of this article, an alternative school is defined as a school or separate class group within a school which is operated in a manner designed to:
(a) Maximize the opportunity for students to develop the positive values of self-reliance, initiative, kindness, spontaneity, resourcefulness, courage, creativity, responsibility, and joy.
(b) Recognize that the best learning takes place when the student learns because of his desire to learn.
(c) Maintain a learning situation maximizing student self-motivation and encouraging the student in his own time to follow his own interests. These interests may be conceived by him totally and independently or may result in whole or in part from a presentation by his teachers of choices of learning projects.
(d) Maximize the opportunity for teachers, parents and students to cooperatively develop the learning process and its subject matter. This opportunity shall be a continuous, permanent process.
(e) Maximize the opportunity for the students, teachers, and parents to continuously react to the changing world, including but not limited to the community in which the school is located.
Notes and commentary — not statutory text
History
Enacted by Stats. 1976, Ch. 1010.
Source of truth
- Edition
- As published in the Legislative Counsel's database, tables dated October 18, 2026 (pubinfo_2025.zip)
- Official file
- https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection.xhtml?lawCode=EDC§ionNum=58500.
- Text hash
- sha256 9be7c1d4109b6c84623b2182267ec5c74ef0d3be3cbf8da74f927224bb9a7b68
- Composed by
- compose_ca.py 2026-10-22: the Legislative Counsel's CAML content files read by a tokenizer (caml_readers.reader_a); an independent xml.etree reading (caml_readers.reader_b) agrees on every section
Cited by 2 provisions
Provisions in this library whose text cites Ed. Code, § 58500. Each shows the citation as that text prints it.
Procedural information only. Not legal advice and not a substitute for the advice of an attorney. Confirm the current text with the official publisher before relying on it.