Gov. Jerry Brown’s education budget proposal would relax California State control over education finance. Due to be finalized this summer, it would give control to local school districts, making it the most significant reform in education finance in 30 years.
“It’s one of the most important conversations … happening in the nation,” Arun Ramanathan, executive director of Education Trust-West, said at a news brief held on March 13 by New America Media. “We are at a critical point right now; these policies tend to stick.”
While in 1972, California ranked in the top 20 for per-pupil spending in education—local property tax being its largest source of revenue—it now ranks among the lowest in the nation. Since the approval of Proposition 13 in 1978, school districts have depended on state provisions that have since dwindled in the face of economic downturn.
Brown’s proposal includes a Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF), which would increase funding by providing a uniform base grant of $6,800 per-pupil in each district. The base grant would return districts to funding levels found in 2007-2008, the year before California state lawmakers cut the K-12 budget by $7.2 billion.
To stimulate equity the LCFF would provide an additional supplemental grant of $2,385 for every target student ESL student, low-income student and foster child in a district. In districts where more than half of the students are disadvantaged a concentration grant would be implemented. For example, a district with 60 percent of these target students would receive a concentration grant of $2,624 per-pupil. Bonuses would be capped at $3,578 for districts where disadvantaged students account for the entire population.
There is concern that the base grant alone is not enough for schools with low-populations of target students.
“There are suburban districts… who have had their budgets cut 25 percent,” said John Fensterwald, editor and co-writer of Edsource Today, an independent online forum dedicated to educational reform. “The money for textbooks and teacher training was never part of their base grant; it was part of their categorical money—separate programs that are being gotten rid of.”
Categorical funds are state-issued funds for programs like Economic Impact Aid for low-income students and transportation costs for special education students. These categorical funds, of which there are 60, are also used for essential instruction materials and teacher training. The LCFF would eliminate the State’s obligation to provide categorical funds in favor of the grant. The reasoning behind this, again, is to shift autonomy to local districts in hopes of inspiring increased equity.
What does this mean for San Francisco schools?
More than half of San Francisco Unified School District students receive free or reduced price meals (an indication of low income status) and approximately a third are ESL students.
These demographics qualify SFUSD for the additional concentration grant. Last year per-pupil spending in SFUSD was $7,250. The LCFF is designed to raise this funding annually from $7,529 by next year to $11,171 by 2019.
SFUSD will act autonomously in allocating these resources where they see fit. Skeptics are fearful that the extra money will not find its way to disadvantaged students.
“Between now and seven years the district really doesn’t have to account for this increment in money, they only have to account for the dollars that they’re spending in 2012,” Fensterwald said. “That’s a huge potential for a lot of bargaining.”
Paul Monge-Rodríguez is an Education Justice Policy associate for Coleman Advocates, a member-run non-profit organization advocating for youth in San Francisco. “The most critical piece is that the community has a really high level of presence,” he said. “They’re using public dollars so we have a right to have access to that decision process.”