The 2026-27 Budget: Child Care and State Preschool

Mar 19, 2026 - Although reducing funding would run counter to the Legislature’s stated goal of increasing child care slots over the long term, this could help the state avoid reductions to other programs that would result in a reduction in the level of services provided to Californians.
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/5168

Assessing a Shift to Enrollment-Based School Funding

Jan 6, 2026 - Overall, our analysis finds that shifting to enrollment ‑based funding would be somewhat more predictable and reduce some administrative burdens for LEAs, but likely would have a negative effect on student attendance over the long run.
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/5100

The 2026-27 Budget: Re-Envisioning State Education Governance

Mar 18, 2026 - Considering Adding Legislative Appointees to the SBE. The Legislature could consider adding two legislative appointees to the SBE. These appointees could enable greater legislative oversight of the new governance system and ensure the SBE ’s policies are consistent with legislative intent.
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/5165

The 2025-26 Budget: Transitional Kindergarten Multilingual Learner Screeners

Feb 26, 2025 - Providing districts with access to a developmentally appropriate screener would help districts identify students in need of language development supports and provide early interventions that can improve English proficiency and academic outcomes over the long run.
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/4990

The 2026-27 Budget: K-12 Proposals

Feb 19, 2026 - The phasing out of targeted funding also provides LEAs with an opportunity to build strong local buy ‑in to help ensure their community will support the model over the long run. (In some cases, LEAs may decide the model was not a good fit for their specific schools.)
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/5131

The 2026-27 Budget: Proposition 98 Guarantee and K-12 Spending Plan

Feb 4, 2026 - The proposal effectively shifts that cost from this year to future budgets —helping address the current budget problem on a one ‑time basis, but adding to the large budget deficits the state is projecting over the next several years.
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/5110

The 2025‑26 Budget: Fiscal Outlook for Schools and Community Colleges

Nov 20, 2024 - Outside of government and health care, the state has added no jobs over the past 18 months. Similarly, the number of Californians who are unemployed is 25  percent higher than during the strong labor markets of 2019 and 2022.
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/4940

Increasing Transparency of County Office of Education Spending

Mar 14, 2024 - The state could consider soliciting input from COEs and other experts on alternative education or other relevant outcome metrics that could be added to the Dashboard that would be a better indication of performance at COE ‑run schools.
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/4883

The 2025-26 Budget: California State University

Feb 25, 2025 - Though the number of students shifted from self‑ to state‑supported courses is smaller in 2024‑25 compared to 2023‑24 (745 FTE students shifted in summer 2024 compared to 4,705 FTE students shifted the previous summer), the effect is still not adding new students but adding new state costs from shifting students formerly in self‑supported courses into state‑supported ones.
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/4989

The 2025-26 Budget: Expanded Learning Opportunities Program

Feb 20, 2025 - Over the Long Run, Fund ELOP Based on Actual Program Participation. Funding ELOP based on a district ’s overall TK ‑6 attendance may have been reasonable as schools were ramping up their programs. After several years of implementation, however, we recommend the Legislature revisit this approach.
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/4977