Starting today, with the sole exception of the 9 a.m. post about censorship, there will be no more posts on Saturday or Sunday. I meant to write and say, NONE! But I could not resist the story about cartoonist Art Spiegelman.
If there is breaking news, I will post it.
Otherwise, enjoy your weekend.
After years of preparation inside and outside the state Capitol (shown), California has launched a website that gathers all sorts of education and career data in a single, searchable place.
Credit: Kirby Lee / AP
California has long lagged behind most other states when it comes to education data systems, choosing to focus on compliance rather than program improvement, but that could change later this year when the first phase of the Cradle-to-Career Data System is expected to go live.
The goal of the new statewide longitudinal data system, known as C2C, is ambitious. It will link data from multiple state departments and education institutions, from early learning through higher education, along with financial aid and social services. The data system is expected to provide resources for students planning for college and careers, as well as data to inform state leaders about effective educational strategies.
States have a responsibility to ensure that everyone has access to timely data to help them to understand how people are navigating education and career pathways, said Jennifer Bell-Ellwanger, president and chief executive officer of the Data Quality Campaign, a national education advocacy organization.
The first phase of the rollout later this year will be a student dashboard that will allow anyone to look at student information, including demographics; number of homeless youth, foster children and students with disabilities; English learner status; drop-out rates, parent education levels; and age of entry into school. The dashboard will not include information about individual students, but can be disaggregated by region, district and state, according to the Cradle-to-Career website.
Another dashboard will follow, reporting on teacher preparation, credentialing, hiring, retention and educator demographics. The data will be provided by the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing.
“This is an exciting moment because we are right on the cusp of seeing the value of connecting these data in one place,” said Christopher Nellum, executive director of The Education Trust-West, a social justice and advocacy organization. “We are going to see very soon the value in individual data providers sharing their data. And that will result in these two dashboards that are coming online very soon.”
Nellum was appointed to the C2C governing board by Gov. Gavin Newsom, but chose to be interviewed for this story as the director of EdTrust-West.
When the Cradle-to-Career Data System is built out, there will be query builders, interactive tutorials and videos, and a library of tables, reports and research. Eventually, researchers will be able to request more comprehensive data from C2C staff.
The data system is housed and managed by the California Government Operations Agency, which was established in 2013 to improve management and accountability of government programs.
“I don’t have any doubt they can get this done,” said Paige Kowalski, executive vice president of the Data Quality Campaign. “They’re well staffed. They have been doing a great job.”
The Data Quality Campaign has been critical of California in the past for its siloed approach to data collection and reporting, but its leaders are optimistic about the new data system.
“I think the work that the state has done on Cradle-to-Career since 2019 has been absolutely flawless and phenomenal, and I just cannot say that about any other data effort I’ve ever seen in any state over the last 20 years,” Kowalski said.
C2C will not only allow the state to play catch-up with the rest of the nation, but could make it the leader in linking data from early education to employment, she said.
It’s not entirely clear how much the Cradle-to-Career Data System will cost. The program has spent $21.4 million so far, with another $10.4 million committed to future work, but not yet spent, according to C2C staff.
During the planning process that began in 2019, the state allocated $2.5 million to plan the data system and another $100,000 each to 15 state departments, universities and other organizations participating in the effort. It’s not clear if all that money was spent, or if some was returned to the state.
The state also increased annual funding to some state departments that provide data and other services to the Cradle-to-Career Data System, including $1.7 million to increase staff at the California Department of Education. It’s unclear how many other departments have received budget increases tied to C2C.
The state has gotten key players to sign data-sharing agreements with C2C: The California Department of Education, California Commission on Teacher Credentialing, University of California, California State University, California Community Colleges, Department of Social Services, Employment Development Department, Department of Industrial Relations, Department of Developmental Services and private universities.
The agreements are voluntary, with no penalty for departments or agencies that fail to provide data in a timely manner. So far, all the data has been submitted on time, according to board members.
“From 2022 to now, C2C has been working diligently with its data providers and its stakeholders to build a strong foundation to support a secure data linkage process given the scope of data C2C is bringing together,” said Angelique Palomar, deputy director of communications. “This includes establishing legal agreements across 16 entities, building the data infrastructure to securely receive and integrate the data across those partners, and the first submission of that data in October 2023.”
Data was submitted again in March, which will be the month partners will share annual data with C2C going forward, Palomar said.
The California Department of Education (CDE), which has fallen behind in providing up-to-date data on its website over the last seven years, will contribute about 70% of the data for C2C, according to CDE staff. It will use the additional state funding to hire more staff to help deliver the data for the project.
Bell-Ellwanger is hopeful all the partners will contribute data in a timely manner.
“These are data that belongs to taxpayers, not to one agency, or any person within the agencies,” she said. “And, so Californians, including researchers, journalists and the public, all deserve access to it.”
C2C was a long time coming. California was one of only 11 states that did not have a data system with formal connections across two or more of the four core areas — early learning, K-12, post secondary and workforce — in 2021, according to the Education Commission of the States.
The Kentucky Center for Statistics is the nation’s gold standard when it comes to education-to-employment data systems, according to Kowalski. California looked to Kentucky when designing the California Cradle-to-Career data system, she said.
California has rolled out several education data systems over the last 30 years, but they have offered siloed information that couldn’t track whether students were successfully moving from school to the workforce.
In the late 1980s, California began to collect school-level data through the California Basic Educational Data System, known as CBEDS, a program still in use today.
In 1997, the state launched the California School Information Services (CSIS) system to streamline the collection and reporting of education data. But the system was obsolete less than five years later when No Child Left Behind became a federal law. CSIS lacked a unique identifier for each student, which the new law required to track student achievement.
In 2009, the state launched the California Longitudinal Pupil Achievement Data System, also known as CALPADS. It includes K-12 student-level demographics, enrollment, grade level, course enrollment and completion, program participation and discipline data, according to the California Department of Education. A 10-digit number is linked to each K-12 student in California, but individual information on students is not made public.
Its companion data system, the California Longitudinal Teacher Integrated Data Education System, or CALTIDES, never went live. The data system would have tracked educator data to facilitate assignment monitoring and to evaluate programs, according to the CDE website. In June 2011, Gov. Jerry Brown vetoed the $2.1 million the Legislature had put in the budget for CALTIDES, which forced the state to give back the $6 million federal grant it had received for the new database.
“He had a belief that Sacramento could not add much value to what districts were doing, and that data was definitely one of those things that was better left to locals,” Kowalski said of Brown.
Instead, CALPADS was built out to a basic level and put in maintenance mode, Kowalski said. But researchers kept beating the drum for data that was useful to people, she said. These are things other states have had for a decade.
Gov. Newsom, having different views than his predecessor, made the Cradle-to-Career Data System part of his campaign for governor. In 2019, the Legislature passed the Cradle-to-Career Data System Act, which called for the creation of a data system to create support tools for teachers, parents and students; enable agencies to optimize educational, workplace and health and human services programs; streamline financial aid administration; and advance research on improving policies.
The state legislation included public engagement in the planning process and required that the 21-member advisory board include members of the public. The California law that mandated the data system also requires an annual survey of students and their families to ensure their voices and experiences guide the work, according to C2C.
This year, C2C officials are holding community meetings across the state to discuss what pieces of information should accompany the dashboards and how they should be displayed.
In Sacramento, community members asked for data disaggregated geographically, possibly by school district. Sacramento’s residents also want informational videos to help train people to use the dashboards. Oakland’s residents were interested in breaking the data down by demographic and educational factors.
“A few years ago, Gov. Newsom and the California Legislature really made it clear through their legislation around California Cradle-to-Career that they wanted this access that we’re talking about for students, families, educators, researchers and the public,” Bell-Ellwanger said. “So I do believe that they are aspiring for this type of transparency that we’re talking about that will also help to build trust in that data.”
Although the rise in transitional kindergarten (TK) enrollment in 2024–25 helped temper the overall decline, K–12 enrollment continues its downward trend.
Enrollment saw its greatest decline in regions of the state with higher housing prices, notably Los Angeles County and Orange County. There is growth in more affordable areas of the state, such as the San Joaquin Valley and Northern California, including the Sacramento area.
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It won’t actually be available until October 10, but it’s now ready for pre-ordering on Amazon, possibly other sites as well.
It’s my memoirs, the story of my life. Growing up in Houston as third of eight children. College. Marriage. Career. Developing my views and values. Discovering that many of my convictions seeed wrong. Saying so. Intimate details of my personal life.
Stuff like that.
The publisher is Columbia University Press.
Courtesy: Kati Begen
Are you a new teacher? If you can, teach summer school!
No, your district did not pay me to say this; there is a method to my madness. Summer school gets a bad rap. Its portrayal in movies doesn’t help either. It’s not just a sweaty classroom full of students who are defiant and rude. In my experience, these are students who just need to fix the mistakes they made in the school year. Summer school should be seen as an opportunity for students and teachers. Teaching summer school can be an extremely beneficial choice, especially for new teachers.
When I was a new teacher, I found volunteering to teach summer school provided me unique opportunities to experiment. In summer school, you can:
Play around with instructional strategies: In the world of teaching, there is a visceral fear of your lesson “bombing.” This fear is what often keeps us from trying new things. During summer school, you have a little more grace. Typically, the classes are smaller, students come in with some background knowledge (if it’s credit recovery, they have already taken the class), and summer school just has a different feel to it. Have you wanted to try an A-B text edit (where students have two different copies of the same article and must decide which words are correctly used)? Socratic seminar? Maybe a specific lab? Doodle notes?
Try it now! Get feedback from the students and see if there is something you need to change. Then, write down notes on how the new strategies fared in the summer school setting. Once the new school year comes around, you have a list of strategies you have vetted and that work.
Try new classroom management strategies: I have taught primarily in middle and high school. Even though middle and high school students are close in age, they require different management strategies.
Surprisingly, my high school students love ClassDojo, a classroom management tool/app, despite its typical audience being elementary school students. I wouldn’t have known this if I hadn’t tried it with my summer school students. Do you want to try flexible seating? Fun claps for an attention signal? Student shout-out wall? Try it during summer school.
If you teach secondary school, you only see your students for one period a day during the school year. In summer school, you see the same group of students for the whole day. You now have the advantage that elementary teachers have. You can try a strategy, work out any kinks with it, and implement it in your class come fall.
Try out a new grade level: When I began teaching, I was fully invested in staying in the middle school world. When the opportunity arose for me to teach a high school class over the summer, I was scared. It seemed like a different beast. Ultimately, I ended up loving teaching high school, and a few years later, I moved up to teaching high school freshmen. This shift wouldn’t have come if I hadn’t tried it out during the summer session. So often, we find our niche and stay there. This is a nice, comfortable place if that is what you are looking for. Sometimes, we want change. Often, we see good teachers leave the profession. I wonder if they might have stayed if they had just tried a different grade level.
I can’t speak for all school districts, but in my experience, summer school made me a better teacher. There are different opportunities out there as well. Maybe you only teach one session? Can you try a different content area? Different school site or even district? There are even online summer schools. The opportunities are as endless as is the potential growth you can acquire.
Teaching can be extremely difficult, so try something new to bring the spark back into your career!
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Kati Begen is a high school biology teacher, doctoral candidate and author of “Thriving During Your First Year of Teaching.”
The opinions expressed in this commentary represent those of the author. EdSource welcomes commentaries representing diverse points of view. If you would like to submit a commentary, please review our guidelines and contact us.
California State University, Fullerton
Credit: CSU Fullerton/Flickr
What began as reports detailing the failure of the California State University to deal with Title IX complaints has led to a new state law requiring that the system take action. Gov. Gavin Newsom on Monday signed the first two bills in a legislative package addressing sexual harassment and violence on college campuses.
Of the bills Newsom signed, the first, Assembly Bill 1790, requires Cal State to implement recommendations in a July 2023 report from the California State Auditor. The audit found the system had “not adequately or consistently addressed some allegations of sexual harassment.” Universities are required to resolve sexual harassment complaints under Title IX, the federal law prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sex in schools.
The second, AB 2608, calls for campuses to update their annual sexual violence and harassment training to include a discussion on “how to recognize if someone is at risk of alcohol- and drug-facilitated sexual assault” beginning in September 2026. The bill applies to Cal State (CSU), the California Community Colleges, the University of California (UC) and higher education institutions that receive state funding. Both CSU and UC registered their support along with the Faculty Association of California Community Colleges.
There are 11 other Title IX-related bills in the legislative pipeline. Cal State leadership is supporting three and has not taken a position on the rest, a spokesperson said.
“The CSU is already working to meet all of the audit requirements,” Cal State spokesperson Amy Bentley-Smith wrote in an email. “AB 1790 adds a requirement of reporting to the legislature on our progress. In terms of an additional workload, this bill will require the CSU (to) share the report we have already agreed to prepare for the State Auditor with the Education Committee.”
Assemblymember Mike Fong, D-Alhambra, was a lead author on both bills signed this week.
The raft of Title IX bills was released following a California Assembly Higher Education Committee report finding that students and faculty at each of California’s three public higher education segments do not trust the way campuses respond to instances of sexual harassment and discrimination.
It was the latest in a series of investigations into how the system handles such misconduct. A 2023 state audit found the CSU system routinely failed to address allegations of sexual assault, including instances in which universities closed cases improperly. In addition, a 232-page systemwide report by the Cozen O’Connor law firm found that the system did not adequately respond to complaints because it was understaffed and lacked enough resources. It also found that CSU did not have a way to handle misconduct that was “disruptive to the learning, living, and working environment” but does not rise to the level of discrimination or harassment.
A spokesperson for Fong wrote in an email to EdSource that each bill was “modified in consultation with stakeholders to address the fiscal implication of the bills” and that the cost of most of the bills in the package should be “minor and absorbable.”
Assemblymember Laura Friedman, D-Burbank, authored AB 810, another bill in the package, which would require job applicants, as part of the hiring process, to disclose decisions determining that they committed sexual harassment.
“We are hopeful the Governor will sign the bill. He has been very proactive when it comes to signing bills to address sexual assault and harassment,” a spokesperson for Friedman wrote. “We haven’t yet spoken to his office regarding 810, but we feel confident that this bill aligns with his previous support in this area.”
In addition to AB 2608, the three Title IX-related bills that have received Cal State’s support are:
A recent CSU news release said the system is restructuring its civil rights services and seeking to “increase staffing at the system and university levels, establish uniform standards and training programs, and develop more robust data collection and tracking systems.”
High school students work together to solve a series of math problems.
Credit: Allison Shelley for American Education
Twice this year, the University of California faculty broadly reaffirmed which high school math courses are required for admissions. However, many school counselors and students, along with the president of the State Board of Education, complain they’re confused by a lack of details.
High schools want to know if their specific course offerings comply with UC requirements. Depending on a student’s interests and intended majors, counselors want to know which courses to recommend. And students want to know if taking less Algebra-intensive math classes like statistics and data science could affect their chances of getting admitted the campus of their choice.
Schools and districts must have “clear, timely and consistent information” so that students and families “understand the impact of their choices,” wrote State Board of Education President Linda Darling-Hammond in a July 15 letter to the UC board of regents.
Prodded by a regents committee, administrators with the University of California Office of the President last week promised to provide more clarity by the end of the summer.
“I feel like we’re not coming at this from a student perspective. I feel we’re coming at this from an academic perspective, and I would really encourage all of us to maybe flip that a little bit, put yourselves in the shoes of a rising sophomore, a rising junior,” regent Alfonso Salazar, who is president of the UC Alumni Associations, said at the meeting. “That would be incredibly helpful because people are very nervous and concerned.”
The confusion centers on the ongoing debate over whether AP Statistics or data science can be substituted for Algebra 2. Over the past decade, the UC faculty committee that determines course requirements approved AP Statistics and, more recently, introductory data science courses as substitutes for Algebra 2, which UC requires for admission. Those decisions will also apply to California State University, whose A-G course requirements for admission are nearly identical for the 23 CSU campuses.
But faced with strong objections from science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) professors, the faculty committee did a hurried about-face in July 2023, days before the state board adopted a math framework that outlined sequences of high school math courses. The faculty committee voted that AP Stats and introductory data science would no longer “validate” or substitute for Algebra 2, starting in the fall of 2025.
The STEM community argued that the courses lacked sufficient Algebra 2 content to prepare students for precalculus, which is a precursor to calculus. Majoring in data science, computer science, and STEM all require calculus. Students who take introductory data science would be under the illusion they are ready to major in data science. UC and many CSU campuses don’t offer catch-up courses in Algebra 2.
Since 1999, the number of students majoring in STEM more than tripled, from 14,081 to 48,851 in 2022. The proportion of STEM majors at UC increased from 32% to 44% of all majors, according to UC data.
The immediate impact of the decision is expected to be limited, since more than 99% of applicants to UC have taken Algebra 2 anyway, according to UC data. But interest in data science, in a world of burgeoning AI and uses for big datasets, has been mushrooming, and promoters pointed to introductory data as a way to skip Algebra 2.
The faculty committee, the Board of Admissions and Relations with Schools or BOARS, reaffirmed that position in February when it accepted a faculty workgroup’s report. The report examined the content of AP Statistics and the three most popular introductory data science courses and found “that none of these courses labeled as ‘data science’ even come close to meeting the required standard to be a ‘more advanced’ course (Algebra 2). They should be called “data literacy” courses, it said.
But where, Darling-Hammond asked in her letter, does that leave the status of potentially hundreds of other courses in data science, financial math and non-AP statistics that UC previously validated as satisfying Algebra 2?
“Most districts will be starting the new school year in less than a month without sufficient clarity regarding the mathematics courses they will offer moving forward,” she wrote. “But the committee’s criteria and process are not yet fully transparent, and it has only evaluated four courses out of the hundreds that have previously been approved.”
One complication facing BOARS and staff within the UC Office of the President, which annually evaluates courses that school districts submit for approval, is that there are no state standards for data literacy. Each course must be examined independently.
Darling-Hammond’s letter raised a critical, intertwined issue: How will UC categorize introductory data science and other courses as fourth-year high school math courses?
Neither UC nor CSU requires that high school graduates take four years of math, but they highly recommend it. According to UC data, about 80% of UC applicants take at least one course in advanced math beyond Algebra 2, usually precalculus or both precalculus and AP Statistics. The report did not include comparable CSU data.
BOARS created a second, 12-member faculty workgroup of STEM professors to examine what math courses will best prepare students to succeed at UC in whatever field they choose. A report in June agreed that the current three required foundational math courses make sense: Algebra I, Geometry, and Algebra 2, or Math 3 in districts that offer an integrated math sequence. It also emphasized that “to be recommended for a fourth year of mathematics study, (a course) must build substantially on the content of the lower-level sequence.”
With that in mind, the report, which BOARS adopted, divided high school math courses into four categories:
Advocates for introductory data science argue that many of their courses cover the same Common Core statistic standards as AP Statistics yet could be cast into the lowest category. Counselors may discourage students from taking data science, and districts may retreat from offering it. That would stunt the growth of data science at a time when other states are encouraging it, said Aly Martinez, who helped design a two-year high school introductory data science and statistics course for San Diego Unified, using CourseKata, a college course.
“Other states are thinking about a wider range of rigorous math courses. California is not doing that. Many districts have done these innovations and seen success. It’s frustrating; it feels like California is closing the door versus opening it,” said Martinez, who is now the chief program officer for the national nonprofit Student Achievement Partners.
Cole Samson, incoming president of the California Mathematics Council, seconded the call for more clarity. The latest UC faculty report “absolutely causes some confusion; it did not outline enough for the next steps,” he said.
High schools that submit math courses for approval in fall 2025 will need clear guidance and feedback on how to revise courses, said Sampson, who is director of curriculum, instruction and accountability for the Kern County superintendent of schools. Whether courses are approved or how they are categorized will affect student choices and master schedules. “UC should be mindful of local impacts,” he said.
UC Provost Katherine Newman acknowledged the need for more information at the regents meeting. “There’s work to be done to communicate what those recommendations mean, she said, adding “I don’t sense amongst my colleagues any hostility toward data science.” On the contrary, she said that UC will work with “our K through 12 partners” to bolster data science courses so that students are well-prepared when they enter UC.
At the end of their June report, the UC math faculty members acknowledged that many high school students find math courses, especially Algebra 2, “overfull of content” and uninteresting. They suggested the UC form another committee to look deeper into how high school math courses can be improved to help students better understand the mathematical concepts. Members should include faculty with expertise in improving the quality of K-12 math.
Another workgroup examining math content, consisting of faculty from UC, CSU and community colleges, may examine this issue of alternative math courses in a report due later this summer.
Sampson said he would welcome that broader opportunity. Many students view Algebra 2 as irrelevant and dull, he said. “It needs a makeover,” he said. “I would champion designing new courses.”
he article was clarified to note that introductory data science courses contain far less algebra content than Algebra II but are not necessarily less rigorous. It noted that UC’s and CSU’s course requirements for admission are nearly identical, but have minor differences. The misidentification of Provost Katherine Newman was corrected.
George Washington Elementary School Principal Gina Lopez welcomes students on the first day of school on July 30.
Credit: Diana Lambert / EdSource
California students, including those in elementary school, will have better access to mental health care, free menstrual products and information about climate change this school year. The expansion of transitional kindergarten also means there will be more 4-year-old students on elementary school campuses.
These and other new pieces of education legislation will go into effect this school year, including a bill that bans schools from suspending students for willful defiance and another that offers college students more transparency around the cost of their courses and the materials they will need to purchase for them.
Here are a few new laws that may impact students in the 2024-25 school year.
Science instruction in all grades — first through 12th — must include an emphasis on the causes and effects of climate change, and methods to mitigate it and adapt to it. Although many schools are already teaching students about climate change, all schools must incorporate the topic into instruction beginning this school year.
Content related to climate change appears in some of the state curriculum frameworks, according to an analysis of Assembly Bill 285, the legislation that created the requirement.
Assemblymember Luz Rivas, D-Arieta, the author of the bill, said the legislation will give the next generation the tools needed to prepare for the future and will cultivate a new generation of climate policy leaders in California.
“Climate change is no longer a future problem waiting for us to act upon — it is already here,” Rivas said in a statement. “Extreme climate events are wreaking havoc across the globe and escalating in severity each year.”
A new law in effect this year adds elementary schools to the public schools that must offer a free and adequate supply of menstruation products — in order to help younger menstruating students.
Last school year, the Menstruation Equity for All Act went into effect, requiring public schools serving sixth- through 12th-grade students to provide menstruation products. It affected over 2,000 schools.
The new law expands the requirement to public schools that serve third- through fifth-grade students. A Senate analysis of the legislation notes that 10% of menstruation periods begin by age 10, according to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report.
The new law requires affected schools to offer free menstrual products in all-gender bathrooms, women’s bathrooms and at least one men’s bathroom on each campus. The legislation, authored by Assemblymember Eloise Gómez Reyes,D-San Bernardino, includes one men’s bathroom on each campus to offer access to transgender boys who menstruate.
Supporters of the bill note that menstruation isn’t always predictable and can strike at inopportune times, such as during a test. Menstruation products can also be pricey — especially for students who might also be struggling with food insecurity.
Girl Scout Troop 76 in the Inland Empire advocated for the bill. Scout Ava Firnkoess said that menstruation access is important to young girls, like her, who started menstruating early.
“I have another friend who also started at a young age. She had to use toilet paper and paper towels because she did not have access to menstrual products,” Firnkoess said in a statement. “We think young students who start their periods need to have access to products, not just those who start in sixth grade or later.”
Elementary students may seem to be getting a little smaller this year, as transitional kindergarten classes are expanded to children who will turn age 5 between Sept. 2 and June 2.
Transitional kindergarten, an additional grade before kindergarten, was created for 4-year-old children who turn 5 before Dec. 2. It has been expanded each year since 2022 to include more children aged 4. All 4-year-old students will be eligible in the fall of 2025.
Gov. Gavin Newsom and State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond have celebrated the expansion of transitional kindergarten, pointing to numbers that show enrollment doubled over the past two years, from 75,000 in 2021-22, to 151,000 in 2023-24. However, a recent analysis by CalMatters found that the percentage of children eligible for transitional kindergarten who actually enrolled had gone down 4 to 7 percentage points.
The typical California college student is expected to spend $1,062 on books and supplies in the 2024-25 academic year, according to the California Student Aid Commission.
The exact costs can be hard for students to predict, leaving them uncertain about how much money to budget for a given class. Assembly Bill 607, which Newsom signed last year, requires California State University campuses and community colleges to disclose upfront the estimated costs of course materials and fees for some of their courses this school year. The bill asks University of California campuses to do the same, but does not make it a requirement.
The schools must provide information for at least 40% of courses by Jan. 1 of next year, increasing that percentage each year until there are cost disclosures for 75% of courses by 2028. This year, campuses should also highlight courses that use free digital course materials and low-cost print materials, according to the legislation.
Proponents of the law, which was co-authored by Assemblymembers Ash Kalra, D-San Jose; Isaac Bryan, D-Los Angeles; and Sabrina Cervantes, D-Inland Empire, said it will promote price transparency. The bill covers digital and physical textbooks as well as software subscriptions and devices like calculators.
A student speaking in support of AB 607 in May 2023 said she felt “helplessly exposed and vulnerable” when she had to appeal to a professor for help covering the surprise costs of a textbook’s online course content.
“If I would have known that a month ahead of time, I could have organized and evaluated my budget in an effective manner for the entire semester,” said Rashal Azar. “This would have prevented my financial anxiety and not triggered my mental health as well.”
Students enrolled in transitional kindergarten, also known as TK, are no longer required to take the initial English Language Proficiency Assessment for California (ELPAC). The test, which measures proficiency in listening, speaking, reading and writing in English, is required to be taken within 30 days of enrollment in kindergarten through 12th grade, if parents indicate in a survey that their children speak another language at home.
Previously, transitional kindergartners also had to take the ELPAC when enrolling. But many school district staff and advocates for English learners said the test was not designed for 4-year-old children and that it was not identifying English learners accurately, because the children were too young to answer questions correctly.
The California Department of Education has directed school districts to mark children’s English language acquisition status as “to be determined” in the California Longitudinal Pupil Achievement Data System, if their parents indicate on the home language survey that their primary or native language is a language other than English. These students will take the initial ELPAC when they begin kindergarten the following year.
Californians Together, which advocates for English learners, and Early Edge California, which advocates for quality early education for all children, were among the organizations that celebrated the bill.
“As the parent of bilingual children and a dual language learner myself, I deeply appreciate Governor Newsom, Assemblymember (Al) Muratsuchi, and California’s legislators for supporting our young multilingual learners by championing AB 2268,” said Patricia Lozano, executive director of Early Edge California in a news release. “This bill will create more support tailored to their needs and strengths, so they can learn and thrive from the early years onward.”
A new law that took effect in July makes it easier for children on Medi-Cal who are 12 or older to consent to mental health treatment inside and outside of schools. Children older than 12 on private insurance can already consent to mental health care without parental consent.
Previously, students in this age group could only consent to mental health treatment without parental approval under a limited number of circumstances: incest, child abuse or serious danger, such as suicidal ideation.
“From mass shootings in public spaces and, in particular, school shootings, as well as fentanyl overdoses and social media bullying, young people are experiencing a new reality,” said Assemblymember Wendy Carrillo, D-Los Angeles, author of the bill. “The new law is about “making sure all young people, regardless if they have private health insurance or are Medi-Cal recipients, have access to mental health resources.”
Children who need mental health care but do not have consent from their parents could potentially seek help from social media and other online resources of sometimes dubious quality, according to the legislation.
The legislation allows mental health professionals to determine whether parental involvement is “inappropriate” and also whether the child in question is mature enough to consent.
California Capitol Connection, a Baptist advocacy group, opposed the bill, stating, “In most cases, a parent knows what is best for their child.”
This is not strictly an education bill, but it does affect schools. The law notes that school-based providers, such as a credentialed school psychologist, find that some students who want to avail themselves of mental health resources are not able to get parental consent.
Beginning this school year, and for the next five years, California students across all grade levels cannot be suspended for willful defiance.
Acts of willful defiance, according to Senate Bill 274, include instances where a student is intentionally disruptive or defies school authorities. Instead of being suspended, these students will be referred to school administrators for intervention and support.
SB 274 builds on previous California legislation that had already banned willful defiance suspensions among first-through-eighth-grade students, and had banned expulsions for willful defiance across the board.
Studies show that willful defiance suspensions disproportionately impact Black male students and increase the likelihood of students dropping out of school.
Los Angeles Unified, Oakland Unified, San Francisco Unified and other school districts have already banned the practice.
SB 274 would apply to all grades TK through 12 in both traditional public schools and charters. The bill would also prohibit schools from suspending or expelling students for being tardy or truant.
After Jan. 1, California schools boards will not be permitted to pass resolutions requiring teachers and staff to notify parents if they believe a child is transgender.
Newsom signed the Support Academic Futures and Educators for Today’s Youth, or SAFETY Act, in July in response to the more than a dozen California school boards that proposed or passed parental notification policies in just over a year. At least seven California school districts passed the policies, often after heated public debate.
The policies require school staff to inform parents if a child asks to use a name or pronoun different from the one assigned at birth, or if they engage in activities and use facilities designed for the opposite sex.
The new law protects school staff from retaliation if they refuse to notify parents of a child’s gender preference. The legislation also provides additional resources and support for LGBTQ+ students at junior high and high schools.
“Politically motivated attacks on the rights, safety and dignity of transgender, nonbinary and other LGBTQ+ youth are on the rise nationwide, including in California,” said Assemblymember Chris Ward, D-San Diego, who introduced the legislation along with the California Legislative LGBTQ Caucus.
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Josh Cowen of Michigan State University read the latest GOP tax bill closely. He explains what it contains for schools. It’s a plan to set up tax havens in every state for the wealthiest Americans. It forces vouchers for religious and private schools into every state, even states that don’t want them. It allows every voucher school to determine its own admissions policy.
It enables discrimination. It enriches those who are already rich.
It is a spike in the heart of public schools, which admit everyone and bring people from different backgrounds together.
Cowen is the author of the recently published book about vouchers, called THE PRIVATEERS: HOW BILLIONAIRES CREATED A CULTURE WAR AND SOLD SCHOOL VOUCHERS.
Stefan Bean is sworn in as Orange County’s 12th superintendent of schools on July 3, 2024.
Credit: Orange County Department of Education
Families of English learners and students with disabilities in Orange County can find inspiration and an ally in Stefan Bean. Supporters of school choice can find an advocate. In June, the five-member Orange County school board unanimously decided Bean has the perspective and skills they were looking for in a superintendent of the Orange County Department of Education.
Two years from now, voters will decide if the board made the right choice.
Bean, 53, was sworn in last month as superintendent to fill out the remaining two years of the term of former Supterintendent Al Mijares, who resigned because of a lengthy battle with cancer. First elected in 2012, Mijares, a past member of the EdSource board of directors, had battled the politically conservative board majority in court and at board meetings. So the board turned to Bean, who lost to Mijares by nearly 10 percentage points in 2022 but promised to consult with them over policies and control of the office’s $380 million budget.
Bean has lived a remarkable life and has an unusual resume for a county superintendent. Paralyzed from the waist down from polio as an infant, he was abandoned on the streets of Saigon before being taken in by an orphanage and then airlifted in 1975 to the United States as part of the Operation Babylift rescue during the chaotic end of the Vietnam War.
Judy and Gregory Bean took him and dozens of other foster children into their San Diego home and later adopted him. A scholarship recipient to USC, Bean became a public elementary school teacher in Fresno and Long Beach, and has spent the last 25 years as a charter school administrator — as the principal, then associate superintendent and superintendent for 11 Aspire Public Schools in Los Angeles.
Most recently, he served as the executive director of the Irvine International Academy, a Mandarin language immersion charter school.
Since his wife died of breast cancer in 2020, Bean has raised their four children, ranging from a daughter who has just graduated from USC, to the youngest daughter, who is in middle school.
EdSource interviewed Bean about his childhood, his perspective on education, and his priorities as county superintendent for two years before an election contest in 2026. His remarks have been edited for length and clarity.
Superintendent, talk about your upbringing and experiences in school.
Judy Bean really taught her family to have compassion for the most vulnerable in our community. She and Dad decided they would care for children who were abused, had issues or disabilities. They had two of their own children and adopted 10, several with disabilities. I had three Black sisters, two Latino brothers, and a Latino brother who passed away at 2 because he had suffered so much brain trauma.
I went to public school in San Diego, where I struggled in elementary school because English was my second language and because IDEA (the landmark federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act) just came out in the ‘70s, and schools were still trying to figure out how to educate students with disabilities. I often found myself in small groups out of the classroom. It didn’t really help with my education to isolate me, and it shaped my drive to be inclusive in education.
I didn’t do very well until I met Donald Geisinger, my sixth-grade teacher. I remain friends with him 43 years later. He saw right through the challenges that I had and said, “Stefan, you’re just going to give oral presentations and skits on the things that you’ve learned — no need to write.” That whole year I just worked on my verbal skills. I spoke Vietnamese quite a bit, and by the end of that year, I began to speak pretty fluent English. From sixth grade on, I began to get straight A’s and (earned) a scholarship to USC.
His heart for students and his seeing my strengths was a springboard to do other things, such as speaking in front of 15,000 people in Washington, D.C., on behalf of the disabled.
How did your experiences shape your perspective on education?
Mr. Geisinger and my father saw people and students through an asset lens. Whether they’re on the autism spectrum or have a physical disability or emotional disability — sure, these are deficits, but we as educators must see the assets in those students, and then lift them up and empower students.
When you say lead from the heart again, how does that translate into action?
You lead with empathy. My mantra has been you involve those who are most affected by decisions. It’s not top-down directed. Obviously there are certain legal and personnel decisions that would have to be made without input. But a lot of decisions that impact educational programming can involve the community and can involve the stakeholders that are impacted by it.
I assume that would be a particular strength in dealing with parents of English learners and parents of students with disabilities.
Absolutely. I now represent many students who have traditionally been left behind. I certainly identify with those students, and I hope that they will look to me as a voice for them.
Your predecessor had a contentious relationship with the board. Since the board chose you, I assume you are more philosophically in tune with them.
I can’t speak on behalf of Dr. Mijares, but I certainly have the utmost respect for his leadership. If I can lead in a collaborative, transparent manner, then I think we can resolve any dispute between the board and the County Department of Education. In my appointment process, I shared my commitment to building collaboration, transparency, and trust and continuing to support our 28 school districts.
How will you do this?
It is common for school districts to have committees in which two (out of five members), sometimes three if you have a larger board, can serve on these committees to really give input (without violating the Brown Act governing open meetings) and receive feedback.
You have been quoted as saying you want to “further expand” the board’s work supporting charters and open up more parental options for education, including charter schools and home schools. Is this a matter of using the bully pulpit? What can and will you do?
As people have been learning about me and meeting me and hearing my vision, they would say that I’m far from using this as a bullying pulpit. It’s the complete opposite, actually. My vision is to lead from the heart in which we serve our principals and serve our schools in this work. But to answer your question, this board certainly believes in alternative education models and therefore charter schools. I believe that most of the superintendents that I’ve met believe that our students have different needs. Therefore, in the name of equity, we must provide what our students need.
How does that work with homeschooling, though?
Many home schools now are charters, and charters are heavily regulated in all aspects. We support charter schools that do the independent study model, which is a lot like home school. We don’t support the private home school models. We do have within the department an independent study model in which students learn from home.
County offices can approve countywide charters but don’t charter proposals go through their individual districts for approval?
A charter school’s initial application goes to a local school district, and then if it’s denied there, they can bring it to their county as a county charter school. That’s one pathway. And then usually, those county charter schools can then later submit to be a countywide charter school. We have over 30 charter schools.
But don’t county boards have restrictions on when they can overturn a local decision?
If a district has denied a charter, they of course have to explain the reasons why. Then that charter can take it to the county board of education and say, “OK, this district denied us for A, B and C. And here’s how we have responded to A, B, and C. So now we would like you to authorize the charter.” There are few restrictions. Our county can certainly do that.
What is your view of social-emotional learning (SEL)?
Social-emotional learning is very important in schools when we do it as a team in a collaborative way. That includes our parents. Social emotional learning is simply helping our students navigate through the challenges of their lives. Helping them to become resilient. That’s exactly what I grew up with. I’ve had many adversities that our students experience. To overcome those, adults, including my parents, teachers, counselors, speech pathologists, special education providers, all of these people helped me to overcome my challenges to become resilient and competent. And that’s what SEL should be doing.
I have cautioned educators (not) to use it as a political tool to push forward something that may not be protecting our students. For instance, I believe 100% that parental involvement is absolutely critical in our education system. And so, if SEL is being used to exclude some of our parents, then we’ve missed the mark. That’s where I’m critical.
What are your priorities for the next two years?
The first priority is just to continue understanding the assets and the values of the department of education throughout Orange County.
My second vision is to remain at the forefront of 21st century competencies and skills and lead the way for our students through our OC Pathways partnerships with districts and ACCESS (Alternative, Community, and Correctional Education Schools and Services) what we call our 29th school district. We serve thousands of students across our county in an alternative education setting and model.
Assuming you do want to run in two years, what will you point to and say, “I’ve made this change, and it’s visible and it affects the way students succeed or not.”
It will be in the areas of where we will lead the nation, in college and career readiness. I wholeheartedly believe in that vision. One of my pushes will be to use some of our reserves to provide grants to our school districts in order to create and promote innovative programming. Three groups I spoke with recently were focused on artificial intelligence, different technical skills and student leadership. Our districts will come up with great ideas, and we will honor them with resources to implement them.