[Qualifications.] The qualifications of such teachers shall be a regular kindergarten primary, elementary or secondary certificate to teach in the schools of California and special fitness to perform the duties of a home teacher; provided, that the salaries of such teachers shall be paid from the city or district special school funds. History: Enacted March 12, 1872; amended March 23, 1893, Stats. § 1616. KINDERGARTEN. The board of education of every city, city and county, or the board of school trustees of every school district in this state, must, upon petition of the parents or guardians of twenty-five or more children between the ages of four and one-half and six years, residing within one mile of any elementary school building situate in such city, city and county, or school district, establish and maintain a kindergarten or kindergartens; provided, that the order of the board establishing such kindergarten or kindergartens shall be made only between the first day of June and the first day of August in any year; and provided, further, that after the first year in which any kindergarten or kindergartens shall have been established and maintained, that the number of kindergartens which shall be maintained in any city, or city and county, or school district, during any particular school year, shall be determined by the governing body of the schools of such city, city and county or school district. [Estimate for maintenance of kindergarten.] The board of education of every city, city and county, or the board of school trustees of every school district in which a kindergarten is established under the provisions of this act, must at least fifteen days before the first day of the month in which the board of supervisors is required by law to levy the taxes required for county purposes, submit to the county superintendent of schools an estimate of the amount of money which will be required for the maintenance of any kindergarten or kindergartens in their several school districts for the ensuing school year. [Levy of tax.] The county superintendent of schools shall thereupon examine said estimate and submit copies of the same, with his approval or disapproval indorsed thereon, to the board of supervisors and to the county auditor at the time he submits to them his estimate for the county school tax for the current year. If the county superintendent of schools approves such estimate, the board of supervisors shall, at the time and in the manner of levying other taxes, levy and cause to be collected in the several school districts for which estimates have been submitted and approved as herein provided, the amount so estimated and approved. The fund so levied shall be known as the kindergarten fund of ....... school district, as the case may be, and shall be available for the maintenance of the kindergarten or kindergartens established under the provisions of this section, and the moneys drawn from such fund shall be paid out in the same manner as the moneys from state and county school funds for the maintenance of the elementary schools are drawn and paid out. [Discontinuance.] If the average daily attendance in any kindergarten in any city, city and county, or school district, shall be ten or less for the school year, the governing body of such city, city and county, or school district, shall, at the close of such school year, discontinue such kindergarten. [Funds revert.] In case a city, city and county, or school district, maintains but one kindergarten, should such kindergarten be discontinued as provided by this section, the funds of such kindergarten shall immediately revert to the elementary schools of the city, city and county, or school district, in which said kindergarten has been located; and in case any city, city and county, or school district maintains two or more kindergartens, the property and funds of a kindergarten which has been discontinued shall revert to the kindergarten or kindergartens which are still in operation in said city, city and county, or school district. [Limit on tax rate.] The rate of taxation which may be levied for the support of kindergartens in any one year shall not exceed ten cents on the one hundred dollars of the taxable property of such city, city and county, or school district; and such tax for the support of the kindergarten or kindergartens, shall be in addition to any other tax which may be levied for the support of the public schools. History: Original section enacted March 12, 1872, declared boards of education to be provided for by special statute; amended April 7, 1880, Code Amdts. 1880 (Pol. C. pt.), p. 36; amended into present shape May 18, 1917, Stats. and Amdts. 1917, p. 742. In effect July 27, 1917. § 1617. INTERMEDIATE SCHOOL COURSE. The board of education of any city, or of any city and county, or the board of school trustees of any school district situated within a high-school district maintaining an intermediate school course, shall permit pupils who have completed the sixth year of the elementary school to attend an intermediate school course established as provided by section one thousand seven hundred fifty a, of the Political Code, and shall pay to such high-school district for the education of such pupils, a tuition charge which shall be agreed upon by said board of education, or board of school trustees, and the high-school board maintaining such intermediate school course; provided, that such board of education or board of school trustees shall not pay to any such high-school board for educating a pupil, residing in such elementary school district and attending such intermediate school course, a tuition charge greater than the average net cost per pupil for educating pupils in the first six years of the elementary school in said elementary school district; and provided, further, that such tuition charge shall cease to be paid after the pupil has completed two years of work in such intermediate school course. History: Enacted March 12, 1872; amended March 13, 1874, Code Amdts. 1873-4, p. 81; April 1, 1878, Code Amdts. 1877-8, p. 28; April 7, 1880, Code Amdts. 1880 (Pol. C. pt.), p. 36; March 4, 1881, Stats. and Amdts. 1881, p. 41; March 15, 1889, Stats. and Amdts. 1889, p. 185; March 20, 1891, Stats. and Amdts. 1891, p. 158; March 23, 1893, Stats. and Amdts. 1893, p. 249; June 14, 1906, Stats. and Amdts. 1906, p. 32, Kerr's Stats. and Amdts. 1906-7, p. 84; April 22, 1909, Stats. and Amdts. 1909, p. 1055; May 1, 1911, Stats. and Amdts. 1911, p. 1362; June 16, 1913, Stats. and Amdts. 1913, p. 1136; May 18, 1917, Stats. and Amdts. 1917, p. 744. In effect July 27, 1917. POWER OF BOARD OF TRUSTEES OF 1-3. Change of location of schools-Com- (subd. 18). 4. Contracts-Estoppel to deny compliance with statute. 5-8. Letting to lowest bidder (subd. 20). 9, 10. Employment of librarian. 11-15. Suspension and expulsion for misconduct (subd. 8). 1. 16. Limitation on right to expel (subd. 8). 17. Waiver of right to expel (subd. 8). Change of location of schools-Compromise of litigation concerning (subd. 18). -The holding of a meeting of qualified electors which could instruct the boards of school trustees in relation to the compromise of pending or threatened litigation, and the voting of a limited sum to be devoted to such compromise seems to be the only limitation on the powers of boards of school trustees to compromise litigation.Smith v. Cloud, 28 Cal. App. 453, 152 Pac. 950. 2. The board of trustees of a high school district possess the power under this section to compromise a claim against the district for damages for the breach of their con tract discharging the principal of the school before the expiration of the term of his employment, and mandamus will lie to compel the county superintendent of schools to approve the warrant for the amount of such compromise.-Smith v. Cloud, 28 Cal. App. 453, 152 Pac. 950. 3. Boards of trustees of school districts are invested, if not expressly, by fair and reasonable implication, with the power of disposing by compromise of the disputed liabilities of their districts; and their powers in this respect are not limited to the sum of one hundred dollars. The only limitation on the powers of the boards of school trustees to compromise threatened litigation against their district is that created through the holding of a meeting of the qualified electors of the school districts as provided in subdivision 18 hereof.-Smith v. Cloud, 28 Cal. App. 453, 152 Pac. 950. erected for a long time, the school district is estopped from defending upon such irregularities in an action by the contractor to recover the reasonable value of materials and services.-McCormick Lumber Co. V. Highland School Dist., 26 Cal. App. 641, 147 Pac. 1183. 5. Letting to lowest bidder (subd. 20).— Because of the limitations on the power of the board to contract, the fact that the district received the benefit of the labor and materials of the contractor does not render it liable on an implied contract in an action on quantum meruit.-Reams v. Cooley, 171 Cal. 150, 152 Pac. 293. 6. While under sections 1617 and 1674 of the Political Code authority is given to school trustees to erect school buildings, there is at the same time by subdivision 22 of section 1617 a mode prescribed for exercising that power, and no implied liability to pay upon a quantum meruit can exist where the prohibition of the statute is disregarded. Reams v. Cooley, 171 Cal. 150, 152 Pac. 293. 7. Where the statute prescribes the only mode by which the power to contract shall be exercised the mode is the measure of the power. A contract made otherwise than as so prescribed is not binding or obligatory as a contract and the doctrine of implied liability has no application in such cases.Reams v. Cooley, 171 Cal. 150, 152 Pac. 293. 8. A contract entered into by the board of trustees of a union high school district for the plastering of the exterior walls of the high school building, which involved an expenditure of more than two hundred dollars, is unenforceable against the district where the contract was not entered into with the lowest responsible bidder on competitive bidding after published notice therefor, notwithstanding the work was included within the original specifications upon which the contractor's bid for the construction of the building was made, and the bid modified by deducting the plastering work therefrom, and the contract for such plastering work thereafter made by taking as a basis the price for which the contractors on the building would have done the work under their total bid, and decreasing that amount by several hundred dollars.-Reams v. Cooley, 171 Cal. 150, 152 Pac. 293. 9. Employment of librarian.-Even though the clause as to the requirement of acceptance of a position within twenty days be held not to apply to the position of librarian, the board of trustees may require one seeking such position to give notice of acceptance within the time provided by this section; and where the board under belief that this section applied required acceptance to be made within twenty days of the position of librarian but there was a failure to do so on the part of the applicant no salary can be recovered.-Hopkins v. Sanderson, 31 Cal. App. 141, 159 Pac. 1063. the 10. Where the president of the school board testified that the board elected plain tiff with the proviso that acceptance must be signed and returned within twenty days or the office would become vacant it was sufficiently made to appear that the employment was conditional upon notice of acceptance being received within twenty days.Hopkins v. Sanderson, 31 Cal. App. 141, 159 Pac. 1063. 11. Suspension and expulsion for misconduct (subd. 8).-The student body of a city high school which is under the immediate supervision of the principal of the school, whose meetings are held on school days and during school hours, and whose proceedings are a part of the school work prescribed for the students by the city superintendent of schools, is a co-ordinate branch of the school, and the proceedings of such body and its conduct individually and collectively, when in meeting assembled on a school day during school hours, is as much within the control and cognizance of the board of education of the school as is the ordinary school work and conduct of the students when assembled in the classrooms upon school days during school hours.-Wooster v. Sunderland, 27 Cal. App. 51, 148 Pac. 959. 12. The board of education of a city high school has inherent jurisdiction to expel a student from the school for the making of an address before the student body intended to discredit and humiliate the board in the eyes of the students and to impair the discipline of the school.-Wooster v. Sunderland, 27 Cal. App. 51, 148 Pac. 959. 13. Such board has the inherent power to summon a student before them to explain and justify his alleged misconduct.-Wooster v. Sunderland, 27 Cal. App. 51, 148 Pac. 959. 14. There are certain obligations on the part of the pupil which are inherent in any proper school system, and which constitute the common law of the school, and which may be enforced without the adoption in advance of any rules upon the subject.Wooster v. Sunderland, 27 Cal. App. 51, 148 Pac. 959. 15. In the school, as in the family, there exists on the part of the pupils the obligation of obedience to lawful commands, subordination and civil deportment, respect for the rights of others, and fidelity to duty. These obligations are inherent in any proper school system, and constitute, so to speak, the common law of the school. Every pupil is presumed to know this law, and is subject to it, whether it has or has not been reenacted by the district board in the form of written rules and regulations.-Wooster v. Sunderland, 27 Cal. App. 51, 148 Pac. 959. 17. Waiver of right to expel (subd. 8).— Where a pupil has made an address to the students during school hours and in the school assembly hall, the purpose of which was to create a spirit of insubordination, and which was subversive to the good order and discipline of the school, a demand by the board of education for an apology was not a waiver of the right to expel him from school.-Wooster v. Sunderland, 27 Cal. App. 51, 148 Pac. 959. § 1617a. UNITED STATES FLAG OVER SCHOOL-HOUSES [repealed]. History: Enactment approved March 15, 1907, Stats. and Amdts. 1907, p. 274, Kerr's Stats. and Amdts. 1906-7, p. 86; repealed May 18, 1917, Stats. and Amdts. 1917, p. 744. In effect July 27, 1917. § 1617b. HOME TEACHERS [repealed]. History: Enactment approved April 10, 1915, Stats. and Amdts. 1915, p. 46; repealed May 18, 1917, Stats. and Amdts. 1917, p. 744. In effect July 27, 1917. § 1617c. BOARDS OF EDUCATION AUTHORIZED TO ESTABLISH KINDERGARTENS [repealed]. History: Enactment approved June 13, 1913, Stats. and Amdts. 1913, p. 805; amended May 22, 1915, Stats. and Amdts. 1915, p. 767; repealed May 18, 1917, Stats. and Amdts. 1917, p. 744. In effect July 27, 1917. § 1617d. PUPILS WHO MAY ATTEND [repealed]. History: Enactment approved April 23, 1915, Stats. and Amdts. 1915, p. 113; repealed May 18, 1917, Stats. and Amdts. 1917, p. 744. In effect July 27, 1917. § 161712. SALE OR LEASING OF SCHOOL PROPERTY. Boards of education, or other governing boards, in cities and having jurisdiction over both the elementary and high-school districts embracing such cities, in which the total number of units of average daily attendance in both such school districts, as shown by the annual report of the county superintendent of schools to the state superintendent of public instruction for the preceding school year, exceeds fifty-five thousand, are hereby authorized to sell, or lease for a term not exceeding ninety-nine years, any real property belonging to their respective school districts, or high-school districts upon which no public school is being maintained upon the following conditions: [Conditions.] Before ordering the sale or lease of any such property such board of education, or other governing boards, shall, in open meeting, by a two-thirds vote of all of its members, adopt a resolution declaring its intention to sell the same, or a resolution declaring its intention to lease the same, as the case may be, which said resolution shall describe the property proposed to be sold, or leased, in such manner as to identify it and shall specify the minimum price, or rental, and terms for which it will be sold, or leased, and fixing a time, not less than three weeks thereafter, and place for a public meeting of said board of education, or other governing board, at which sealed proposals to purchase or lease, as the case may be, will be received and considered. Said resolution shall, before the date of such meeting, be published once a week for three successive weeks in one or more newspapers of general circulation published in the district. At the time and place fixed in said resolution for the meeting of said board of education or other governing board, all sealed proposals which have been received shall, in public session, be opened, examined, and declared by said board, or other governing board, and the property be sold, or leased, as the case may be, to the highest responsible bidder among those who have submitted sealed proposals and who offer to comply with all terms and conditions specified in the resolution of intention to sell or lease; provided, however, that if any responsible person shall at said meeting offer to purchase such property, or to lease such property, as the case may be, for a price or rental exceeding the highest other proposal or offer before the board by not less than five per cent, the property shall be sold, or shall be leased as the case may be, to such person; and provided, further, that said board or other governing board may, should it deem such action for the best public interest, at any time, reject any or all bids, and withdraw such property from sale. Any order of sale or lease made hereunder by said board, or other governing board, shall authorize and direct the execution and delivery by the chairman, or other presiding officer, of said board, or other governing board, of the deed or lease of said district to the purchaser or lessee. This section shall not be taken to authorize action upon proposals for sale and proposals for lease at the same meeting. [Effect of act.] The provisions of this section shall be deemed to supersede any other provision of law relating to powers and duties of boards of trustees, and boards of education, only in so far as its terms are in conflict therewith, and shall not be deemed as repealing any such other provision of law not conflicting with the terms of this section. History: Enactment approved June 1, 1917, Stats. and Amdts. 1917, p. 1645. In effect July 31, 1917. § 1617b. CONTRACT WITH STATE NORMAL-SCHOOL FOR EDUCATION OF CHILDREN. The trustees of an elementary school district with an average daily attendance of thirty-five or less, as shown by the last teacher's report on file in the office of the county superintendent of schools, when authorized by a majority vote of their district at a district meeting called for that purpose, may contract with a state normal-school for the education of the children of their district; provided: 1. That the elementary school so contracting shall be housed by the normal-school on the normal-school campus or in the schoolhouse in the district and shall be used as a rural model practice school. 2. That the trustees of the elementary school district shall contribute to the support of the school all of the money apportioned to their district from the state and county funds. Said funds to be handled and expended by the trustees of the elementary school district in the same manner as provided by law. [Revocation.] Such contract may be revoked by a majority vote of the board of trustees of the normal-school or by the trustees of the elementary school district, when authorized to do so by a majority vote of their district at a special district meeting called for that purpose. Such contract shall be in effect from July first following date of contract and shall remain in effect until the end of the school year in which the contract is revoked. History: Enactment approved May 31, 1917, Stats. and Amdts. 1917, p. 1516. In effect July 30, 1917. § 1619. MUST MAINTAIN ALL SCHOOLS FOR EQUAL LENGTH OF TIME. EQUAL RIGHTS AND PRIVILEGES. First. Except where a school has been closed by order of a city or a county board of health or of the state board of health, on account of contagious disease, or where such school has been closed on account of fire, flood or other public disaster, boards of school trustees and city boards of education must maintain all of the elementary day schools established by them for an equal length of time during the year, and all of the day high-schools established by them for an equal length of time during the year, and, as far as possible, with equal rights and privileges; provided, that boards of school trustees and city boards of education may establish and maintain vacation schools of kindergarten, elementary, or high-school grade. [Vacation schools.] No vacation school shall be established until a school of equal grade has been maintained for at least eight months. The duties of teachers, courses of study, length of school day, and all other matter relating to vacation schools, shall be determined by the boards of school trustees, or by the city board of education. |