District Administration - July 2010 - (Page 36)

The Golden State Loses Its Luster due to the crisis. “We have 40 percent fewer administrators and teachers than the average school in America,” adds John Mockler, California’s former education secretary in 2000-2001 who now runs John B. Mockler Associates, a Sacramentobased consulting ﬁrm that specializes in education policy and ﬁnance. “We have fewer qualiﬁed bodies dealing with a more complex set of kids.” No Longer a Leader “I regard education as a subject of particular importance here in California, from our location and the circumstances under which we are placed, the immense value of our lands and the extent and wealth of the country,” stated Robert Semple, the delegate from Solano County, at the 1849 constitutional convention in Monterey. “I think,” he continued, “that here, above all places in the Union, we should have, and we possess the resources to have, a well regulated system of education.” ose resources today are the focus of a developing legal battle that could determine the course of education in California for years to come. In a lawsuit—RoblesWong et al. v. State of California, ﬁled in May in the Alameda County Superior Court—several major constituencies of California’s K12 system are asking that the current way of ﬁnancing education in the state be declared unconstitutional and that California be required to establish a new system that gives all students an equal opportunity to meet the academic goals set by the state. In addition to the plaintiﬀ, Maya Robles-Wong, a 16-year-old junior at Alameda High School, the suit is being brought by the Association of California School Administrators, the California School Boards Association, the California Maya Robles-Wong, a junior in Alameda, explains a lawsuit that she ﬁled against the state last May. e lawsuit seeks to force the governor and legislature to develop a new system to fund public schools. Superintendent Carlos Garcia, of San Francisco, sits to the right. State PTA and nine districts. “We urgently need to prioritize this responsibility to our students and future generations,” O’Connell says. But Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger opposes the legal challenge. His oﬃce responded with: “We will continue to ﬁght to keep education a budget priority,” according to state Secretary of Education Bonnie Reiss. Because of term limits, both O’Connell and Schwarzenegger, who are nearing “We urgently need to prioritize this responsibility to our students and future generations.” —Jack O’Connell, state superintendent of public instruction, California the end of their second terms, cannot run again this year, so new leaders, to be elected in November, will control the future course of public education in California that the outcome of the case will help determine. e path to the lawsuit was started in 1978, when voters approved Proposition 13, a ballot initiative that essentially capped local property taxes and thereby restricted local funding for schools. at led the state to assume a larger role in ﬁnancing the schools. e most devas- tating part of Prop 13, says Mockler, was requiring a two-thirds vote of the legislature to raise state and local taxes, allowing a small minority to block funding increases for schools. “ e public schools began a slow and steady descent,” he says. “California was one of the leading states in terms of both student achievement and funding for our schools, and now we’ve fallen to near the bottom for both,” says Bob Wells, executive director of the Association of California School Administrators. In student achievement, California ranked next to last among participating states on performance by fourth-graders in the 1994 National Assessment of Educational Progress. In the mid-1960s, California was ranked ﬁfth in the nation in per-pupil spending, according to a history of school ﬁnance produced by the Los Altos School District. e state has fallen to 47th in per-pupil spending, nearly $2,400 below the national average. O’Connell says that the state education department is operating on almost $17 billion less than it had anticipated two years ago. “We are disinvesting in public education. It’s wrong, it’s unacceptable, and we need to change direction,” he says. Schwarzenegger has “been dismal on funding,” he adds. “He’s been terrible, 1978: Proposition 13 caps local property taxes, placing a greater burden on the state to ﬁnance public schools. PROP 13 1992: Fuzzy math reform in California is promoted by the “Mathematics Framework for California Public Schools,” the state education department’s advisory document. 1998: The state board of ed approves a new “Mathematics Framework,” focusing on rigorous math. 2010: Gov. Schwarzenegger and the state are sued to establish a new system that gives all students equal opportunity. 36 July/August 2010 District Administration

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of District Administration - July 2010

District Administration - July 2010
Contents
Advertiser Index
Letters
From the Editor
News Update
Sustainability Update
Technology Update
Curriculum Update
Administrator Profile
District Profile
The Golden State Loses Its Luster
Seeking Justice in San Francisco
The Push for Public Preschool
Gearing up for the New Assessment
Books
Products
Online Edge
Supervisor’s Insights
Crisis Response
Supervisor’s Opinion
Tech Disruptions
Professional Opinion
Professional Opinion

District Administration - July 2010