Report Examining the Reach of Targeted School Funding By Julien Lafortune, Joseph Herrera, Niu Gao Sep 6, 2023 Under California’s ten-year-old funding formula, districts with higher shares of high-need students receive additional dollars on top of base funding. Districts have flexibility around spending these funds, but when money is not fully directed to the intended students and schools, the impact on achievement gaps is diluted.
Policy Brief Policy Brief: District Spending of One-Time Funds for Educational Recovery By Julien Lafortune, Laura Hill, Niu Gao, Joseph Herrera ... Jun 28, 2023 States received billions in one-time stimulus funds to help recover from pandemic disruptions to education. California allocated much of its money to districts based on their shares of low-income students, which largely targeted schools with lower achievement levels rather than greater learning loss.
Report District Spending of One-Time Funds for Educational Recovery By Julien Lafortune, Laura Hill, Niu Gao, Joseph Herrera ... Jun 28, 2023 To address COVID-19 disruptions to education, federal and state programs directed billions in stimulus aid to K–12 schools. These programs allocated greater funding to lower-income and high-need districts—and California districts applied their early funds to health, safety, and technology. More recently, spending has prioritized learning recovery.
Report Exploring the Potential for Water-Limited Agriculture in the San Joaquin Valley By Caitlin Peterson, Cameron Pittelkow, Mark Lundy Jul 20, 2022 As irrigated farmland comes out of production in the San Joaquin Valley, valley residents will face increased pests, weeds, and dust—as well as a loss of employment and economic activity. Water-limited cropping is one alternative to fallowing that can improve soil health and air quality, create habitat, and keep land in production.
Report Understanding the Effects of School Funding By Julien Lafortune May 18, 2022 Funding for California’s K–12 public schools has reached record highs, but gaps in student outcomes remain. Understanding the benefits of additional funds, and how to distribute those funds, are key concerns for policymakers. This report offers insights from a robust body of research on the extent to which higher spending improves outcomes.
Report Community College Math in California’s New Era of Student Access By Marisol Cuellar Mejia, Olga Rodriguez, Hans Johnson, Cesar Alesi Perez Dec 7, 2021 In fall 2019, California’s community colleges began implementing AB 705, making reforms to place thousands of students away from remedial courses and directly into the introductory courses necessary to transfer to a four-year college. In this report, we focus on math courses and the progress that colleges and students have made under the new system as of fall 2020.
Report Targeted K–12 Funding and Student Outcomes By Julien Lafortune Oct 6, 2021 As students return to the classroom, record-high funding through the Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) will help California districts address gaps after a year of remote learning. In this report, we examine school and district spending against trends in student outcomes to offer insight into whether the LCFF is meeting its goal of improving equity in education.
blog post Federal Spending Bill Boosts Education Funds in California By Courtney Lee, Niu Gao, Patrick Murphy May 2, 2018 California’s schools stand to gain in the recent spending bill passed by Congress, despite cuts proposed by the president.
Report Alternatives to Incarceration in California By Ryken Grattet, Brandon Martin Apr 17, 2015 Three-plus years after implementing a major realignment of its public safety systems, California continues to face pressure to reduce both its prison and jail populations. California relied on some alternatives to custody-based punishment before realignment but it has been expanding its use of others. Current research on the effects of incarceration and its alternatives offers a general endorsement of the idea that increasing reliance on community-based alternatives is not likely to result in large increases in crime and recidivism. The evidence suggests that the effectiveness of both incarceration and community-based supervision depends on a number of factors, including the rate of incarceration in a given community, the offender characteristics, and the nature of the response to violations during and after supervision. Finally, intensive data collection on county implementation efforts can help the state identify the community-based strategies that produce the best outcomes.
