February 7, 2018 - In this report, we analyze the Governor’s overall Proposition 98 budget package as well as his specific spending proposals for K‑12 education and early education.
March 8, 2016 - Presented to Assembly Budget Subcommittee No. 2 on Education Finance
February 15, 2022 - This post provides background on school funding and literacy, describes the Governor’s K-12 early literacy proposals for schools, and offers associated assessments and recommendations to the Legislature.
February 9, 2017 - An analysis of the Governor’s overall 2017-18 Proposition 98 budget package as well as his specific spending proposals for K‑12 education, including a summary of our recommendations.
January 21, 2015 - Presented to: Senate Education Committee
March 7, 2025 - In this brief, we assess the Governor’s 2025-26 educator workforce proposals and provide associated recommendations.
October 19, 2015 - Each year, the Legislative Analyst's Office publishes its Spending Plan publication to summarize the state's annual budget. Passed in June 2015, with various amendments later during the year's legislative session, the state's 2015-16 spending plan includes a large increase in funding for schools and community colleges. The budget makes augmentations to child care and preschool, higher education, and various health and human services programs. The plan also creates a new state earned income tax credit to increase the after-tax income of low-income workers.
October 24, 2022 - This post summarizes overall Proposition 98 funding and K-12 education spending in the 2022-23 budget package. It is part of our Spending Plan series, which contains posts focused on each major sector of the state budget.
September 16, 2024 - This post summarizes Proposition 98 funding and K-12 education spending in the 2024-25 budget package.
February 19, 2003 - We identify several areas where the Legislature could reduce the assessment burden on school districts while maintaining the state's emphasis on academic content and performance standards: the NRT portion of the STAR program, the primary language test, the Golden State Exams, and the physical fitness test.
March 9, 2017 - Presented to: Senate Budget and Fiscal Review Subcommittee No. 1 on Education
February 15, 2024 - In this report, we assess the architecture of the Governor’s overall Proposition 98 budget and analyze his major proposals for K-12 education.
February 26, 2014 - Traditionally, the state has reimbursed local educational agencies (LEAs) for performing mandated activities by requiring them to submit detailed documentation of their costs. In recent years, the state has tried to simplify this process by creating two alternative reimbursement structures. The reasonable reimbursement methodology (RRM) provides reimbursement for a particular mandate using a formula developed in a quasi-judicial forum. The education mandates block grants (one for schools and one for community colleges) provide reimbursement for all active education mandates using a per-student rate established in the budget. Whereas the rarely used RRM process has been very adversarial (once involving litigation) and resulted in long reimbursement delays, nearly all LEAs have chosen to participate in the block grants. Given their overlapping purposes and the comparative advantages of the block grants, we recommend the Legislature repeal the RRM for education mandates.
February 23, 2022 - In his January budget, the Governor proposes $2 billion in one-time funding across three programs to increase college and career readiness among high school students. In this post, we provide background on the state’s programs, describe and assess the Governor’s proposals, and provide our recommendations to the Legislature.