by Brian Leubitz [courtesy of Calitics - Front Page]

[courtesy of California Progress Report]

By State Senator Sheila Kuehl

This is my second essay on the California budget. The first set out some background information on California’s budget, beginning with the actions taken on the 2007-2008 budget earlier this year. This essay will set out the 2008-2009 budget originally proposed by the Governor in January. Following essays will detail the new budget proposals contained in the May Revision (usually called the May Revise) to the January budget, divided into sections by subject matter along with analyses of the winners, the losers, the false scares, the posturing, and some possible conclusions.

The Governor’s original budget, as introduced in January, for 2008-09

The Governor’s budget seemed to have been introduced with the aim of scaring the lights out of every segment of California. Education was slashed. Parks were to be closed. Health and human services were proposed to be decimated (actually more, as “decimated”, from the root “dec”, means to cut by one tenth). Every department, tasked with enforcing every kind of California law, was proposed for a 10% cut, which would have pretty much guaranteed no serious enforcement at all.

Why so dire? Income

[courtesy of California Progress Report]

Last Friday, the committee commissioned by Governor Schwarzenegger in April of 2005 to “analyze current impediments to excellence, explore ideas and best practices relevant to California, and recommend changes and reforms,” on the state’s K-12 educational system, issued its report: “Students First, Renewing Hope for California’s Future.”

This is a 44 page summary report and there are other reports, research, and recommendations on the Governor’s Committee on Education Excellence site as well.

The committee is a non-partisan, privately-funded group. Its specific charge was to “focus on four inter-related topics: governance, finance, teacher recruitment and retention, and administrator preparation and retention.” They describe their process as follows:

[courtesy of California Progress Report]

By Carol Millar

It’s a rare and entirely frightening, anxiety- producing feeling that has recently come over me. During the day I feel it alternately as a heavy, helpless, immune-compromising depression, or as a goad to flailing, manic, spin your wheels, do anything, something action. At night it wakes me for a sleepless hour of thinking that bounces me from one extreme idea to another – move to Europe (Sweden perhaps?), home-school the children, figure out how to make some serious money -- and finally exhausts me enough to catch a few more hours of sleep.

[courtesy of The California Majority Report]

Today the Education Coalition launched a 60-second statewide radio ad calling on the Governor and the Legislature to stop making drastic cuts to education funding. The ad features a student in an overcrowded classroom talking about the potential impact of the Governor’s proposed $4.8 billion funding cut to schools, the equivalent of raising all class sizes by 35 percent.

To hear audio of the spot, go here.

Here's the script...

California Education Coalition

"Think"

(SFX: Classroom din
starts out low and reasonable)

Student: You don’t have to tell kids like me California has the largest class sizes in the nation. We live it -- every day we’re in school.

(SFX: Classroom din begins to get louder...)

And, yes -- it makes it harder to learn.

(SFX: ...and louder...)

Harder to concentrate.

(SFX: ...and louder...)

Harder to get the attention I need!

There's more...

by Julia Rosen [courtesy of Working Californians blogs]

This state desperately needs a big boost to our education funding. There are some greatly needed reforms and Arnold wants to make this year, the year of education. But that is going to be tough. The scope of the problems are very large and so is our current budget deficit. That said, he is still pushing forward and his blue ribbon panel has just released a proposal, complete with a $6 billion price tag. Merc:

Setting the stage for Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's "Year of Education," a panel he appointed has proposed a sweeping set of reforms that will help define the debate, including performance-based pay for teachers, universal preschool and full-day kindergarten.

A blueprint of the recommendations obtained by the Mercury News also calls for:

• Billions more to be spent each year to educate English-learners and other low-income students who are lagging behind more affluent peers.

• A sophisticated new data system to better track students' successes and failures.

• A school "inspection system" similar to those used in New York City and several European countries. To increase the accountability of schools, the results of the inspections would immediately be made available to the public.

read more »