Low-income groups file school funding suit
Adding counterpoint to a growing chorus, four groups representing low-income parents and students filed suit in Superior Court on Monday, charging California’s inadequate and inequitable school funding violates for all children an equal opportunity to a “meaningful education.”
“The State of California is failing to keep its promise of an education to our children,” states the opening lines to a 52-page complaint, Campaign for Quality Education v. State of California and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
The latest suit follows by two months the filing of similar litigation, Robles-Wong v. California, by the big powers in Sacramento: the California School Boards Assn., Association of California School Administrators, the state PTA and nine school districts. The new coalition also filed its suit in Alameda County Superior Court, in anticipation that the two suits will be combined and as an indication of mutual interests as well as distinct goals.
The coalition – Alliance for Californians for Community Empowerment, Californians for Justice, San Francisco Organizing Project and Campaign for Quality Education, along with 21 individual plaintiffs, students and adults – cited the same clauses in the state Constitution and court cases establishing education as a fundamental right and funding as a legislative priority as did plaintiffs in Robles-Wong. The complaint recited the same long list of failings: the state’s rank-bottom national rankings in funding, resources and test scores; the punishing and disparate impact of budget and staffing cuts on low-income schools; the failure of the state to match its rigorous academic demands with sufficient funding.
Both suits seek the same broad outcome: a rational system that provides all students with the knowledge and skills to go to college or enter the workplace prepared. Both complaints cite the state’s failure to capitalize on the findings of previous studies and recommendations for reform: Stanford-led Getting Down to Facts studies and the 2008 Governor’s Advisory Committee on Education Excellence. Neither suit prescribes a specific funding increase or finance system.
But the coalition also wants to separately assert the interests of low-income and minorities children, which is why the groups didn’t join Robles-Wong or simply act as intervenors. The complaint implies that these students will need proportionately more resources, including quality pre-school, because “it is incumbent upon the State to ensure that low-income students—as early as possible in their educational experience—are able to overcome the impediments to learning that come with the effects of poverty.”
Emphasis on efficient use of money
In a subtle distinction from Robles-Wong, the Coalition also stresses the importance of using money effectively.
“This is not typical of an adequacy suit, but it only makes sense to implement a wise use of new and existing funds,” said John Affeldt, managing attorney for Public Advocates Inc., a San Francisco-based public interest law firm that’s one of three law firms handling the case. Public Advocates also served as a lead counsel in the two previous landmark funding cases, Williams v. California and Serrano v. Priest.
Without explicitly mentioning the troubled CalPADS data system, the suit says that “the system suffers from an inadequate data system that would ensure dollars are spent on programs and policies that have the most impact on providing access to a meaningful education.”
Noting that properly trained and supported teachers are the most important factor leading to academic improvement, the complaint cites the state’s failure to adopt policies and district-level systems that will “identify and support effective teachers and identify, support, and remediate teachers in need of improvement.”
Including an effective student data system and fair system of teacher performance reviews in a suit for more funding could be a wise tactic – if settlement talks with the next governor ever begin.
Information on the suit and the plaintiffs, including a 4-minute video, can be found at Fair Schools Now website.
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SVEF is the education foundation advocating for the needs of school districts across Silicon Valley. SVEF seeks to improve public education through establishing partnerships with the private sector and the education community ..
These lawsuits are a clear message that failing to provide an adequate education is a high stakes issue for californianss.
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So maybe the parents of children that are illegal aliens can pay more taxes? Thats fair and equitable. Why should my taxes be raised to educate people who arent supposed to be here in the first place.
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It has been over 20 years since the voters were sold on The Classroom Instruction and Accountability Act — aka Prop. 98, aka “the Sacred Text.” Didn’t work out too well for students, parents, or taxpayers, but California teachers are consistently the first or second highest paid in the nation. So now we have lawyers suing for even more money. More money does not work in Washington, DC, did not work in Kansas City, and is not needed in Utah. The problem in California is a hydra-headed education governance structure and a 2,000+ page Ed Code that is constantly changing, breeding mediocrity and a culture of compliance (rather than results) in schools staffed with educators who want to succeed but have been let down by policymakers and union bosses. “Public” Advocates et al. must know this, so why do they sue? What’s in it for them?
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Roma, the problem is that Prop. 98 has offset school funding to the state – and the state can’t manage that financially. Prop. 98 has been repeatedly underfunded, suspended, etc. for years now.
The reason the state’s share has become so unwieldy is that local school funding in California is poor. Comparatively, California’s schools – inarguably underfunded – are much more heavily paid for by state than by county an dcity funds.
I have to tell you, as a veteran and highly successful educator in very high-needs schools, I find your claims both untrue and offensive. Over the past ten years, I have raised tens of thousands in private funds and spent thousands out of my own pockets to provide resources that the state doesn’t: everything from snacks for students struggling with food insecurity to picture books to pencils to field trips. Without these supplementary materials, my students’ schooling would not only be bleak: it would fail them.
I encourage you to talk to educators and/or the SFOP, ACCE and Public Advocates and visit some high needs schools before explaining to us our secret nefarious plans.
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Actually, the problem is that schools cope with the challenges and pathologies that young people bring to school with them, caused by poverty and fractured, violent communities. Public schools that serve students from stable families who can afford to live comfortably in safe communities do just fine. And that’s despite the “hydra-headed education governance structure … mediocrity … culture of compliance … union bosses” and whatever other supposed demons are conjured up by opponents of public education. It’s simply false that adequate funding — used wisely — would not make a huge difference in solving these problems. Real-life experience and common sense show that students learn more successfully when their basic needs are met and when they get adequate personal attention from educators. Those things cost money. Private school parents routinely spend $25K-$35K on annual tuition — they obviously don’t agree that “more money does not work.”
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