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  • California’s new cradle-to-career system can illuminate student pathways

    California’s new cradle-to-career system can illuminate student pathways


    Cal State Northridge

    Credit: Julie Leopo/EdSource

    From our smartwatches giving us metrics on our last workout, to utility dashboards helping us meet our environmental conservation goals, we are living in an increasingly data-driven world. But when it comes to figuring out an education or career path, it can be hard to find useful information to make sound decisions.

    Where do young people from my city go after high school? What education or training programs can help me earn livable wages? How do I figure out college applications and get financial aid? These are all questions that have been difficult for Californians to answer as they decide what jobs to pursue and whether to attend college.

    But California recently took a big step toward making data available in tangible, easy-to-access ways. The new California Cradle-to-Career Data System (C2C) connects the dots from early and K-12 education, to higher education and the workforce. It’s a new, longitudinal data system that can enable people to make more informed decisions about their lives. As early as 2024, Californians will have access to C2C’s first planned dashboard.

    The longitudinal data system will illuminate the journey from cradle to career. A guidance counselor wonders whether her former students stayed in college. Universities working to help students succeed can’t see what K-12 supports students did — or didn’t — receive.

    The C2C system can stitch together data that can tell those stories across time. Those connections and transitions become visible only when the data from multiple education systems is linked together.

    How will people be able to use that data that stretches over time? Before the data system launched, the system’s data providers worked together with members of the public to map out priority topics for specific data dashboards. Each one will create a “data story” focused on topics like:

    • student pathways from high school to college and career.
    • the experiences of community college students aiming to transfer to a four-year university.
    • employment outcomes illuminating paths to jobs with livable wages.

    We’re prioritizing the needs that communities have voiced before developing useful tools. The California Legislature took bold action in passing the Cradle-to-Career Data System Act. It wrote into state law that the data system must prioritize the needs of students and families. This means listening to communities first, and then working to build data tools people will actually use.

    What have Californians shared? Right now, the most requested feature is the ability to break down the data by geography and demographics. People want to know, “What story does the data tell in my community?”

    What challenges are Californians in rural areas facing in their education and workforce sectors? What needs are not being met to ensure educational success and individual prosperity? People with lived experiences in these communities can best answer these questions. 

    To get input from across the state, C2C hosts community conversations where people can voice their priorities, both online and in-person. Recent events were held in Sacramento and Oakland, and the Central Valley and Southern California are up next. Building the country’s most inclusive data system requires collaboration, and that is top of mind for the Cradle-to-Career data system.

    Launching an intentionally inclusive data system has taken a historic, governmentwide effort. Those of us in the Legislature are working with the Newsom administration to break down the silos that can make it hard to share data with the public. Champions of the data system understand that data works for individuals when it empowers them to make decisions about their futures. Informed decisionmaking is key to ensuring every Californian has the freedom to succeed, and that starts with a reliable and actionable statewide longitudinal data system.

    •••

    Mary Ann Bates is the executive director of the Office of Cradle-to-Career Data.
    Assemblymember Jacqui Irwin represents California’s 42nd District.
    Sen. John Laird represents California’s 17th District.

    The opinions in this commentary are those of the authors. If you would like to submit a commentary, please review our guidelines and contact us.





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  • California Community Colleges approves 6 new bachelor’s degree programs

    California Community Colleges approves 6 new bachelor’s degree programs


    Dental hygiene program at Fresno College.

    Credit: Fresno City College

    Six additional bachelor’s degree programs have been approved across California’s community colleges, the state chancellor’s office for the college system announced. 

    With the approvals, there are now 39 bachelor’s degree programs that are being offered or will soon be offered across the community college system. 

    The latest programs to be approved include respiratory care at Antelope Valley College, paramedicine at College of the Siskiyous, dental hygiene at both Cypress College and Oxnard College, paralegal studies at Santa Ana College and respiratory care therapist at Victor Valley College.

     “Through the Baccalaureate Degree Program we are broadening the reach of higher education and skill development to a greater number of students by offering affordable and quality opportunities close to home,” Aisha Lowe, an executive vice chancellor for the college system, said in a statement.

    There are now 32 different community colleges across the state with at least one bachelor’s degree program. A few colleges have multiple offerings, including Antelope Valley, Cypress and Santa Ana with their latest approvals.

    The number of bachelor’s degrees being offered across the community colleges will likely continue to increase. In January, colleges submitted another 13 program applications that are currently under review. 

    Under a 2021 state law, the community college system can approve up to 30 bachelor’s degrees annually, across two cycles each year. The degrees are all offered in high-demand career fields such as dental hygiene and automotive education. 

    By offering those degrees at the community college level, students can earn a bachelor’s degree for a fraction of what it costs to get one at a four-year university. In some cases, the degrees are also more accessible, since there are some community colleges offering them in parts of the state where there isn’t a University of California or California State University campus.

    To get approved, the programs must first go through intersegmental review, a process in which the California State University and the University of California systems get to say whether they object to the degrees. Under state law, the programs can’t duplicate programs that are offered at UC or CSU.

    That has been a point of contention, particularly with CSU, which has raised duplication concerns about several programs that community colleges have proposed, something that has delayed the approval process. Currently, 11 programs remain under intersegmental review.

    Community college officials say they are working with CSU officials to establish a better process for resolving those disputes more quickly in the future.

    Because the community colleges can’t create bachelor’s degree programs that are already available at CSU and UC, they have been prevented from offering degrees in some fields with worker shortages, such as nursing. Newly proposed legislation aims to change that: Senate Bill 895 would allow 15 community colleges to begin offering bachelor’s degrees in nursing.





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  • How earning a college degree put four California men on a path from prison to new lives | Documentary 

    How earning a college degree put four California men on a path from prison to new lives | Documentary 


    Jennifer Molina
    May 9, 2024

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypfojKZMnGQ

    Samual N. Brown, Allen Burnett, Charlie Praphatananda and Dara Yin have stories to tell.

    Their time in prison was shrouded by their reality. Three of the four were charged with murder and sentenced to life without parole. It’s what one of them, who entered prison at 20, describes as death by incarceration.

    Taking college courses had been going on for decades in California prisons, but in 2016, California State University Los Angeles became the first college to offer bachelor’s degrees to people in prison.

    Now, eight of the state’s 34 adult prisons have started or are soon to begin partnerships that award four-year degrees, making California a leader in expanding college degree programs into the state’s prisons.

    The trend touches only a sliver of incarcerated people, however. While California incarcerates about 95,600 people in its prison system, about 230 enrolled in the fall in a bachelor’s degree program. For the four men whose stories are told in this documentary, just the chance to earn the degree made it possible for them to see themselves living a different life outside of prison. Three ultimately got their sentences commuted. The fourth was paroled.

    Read more:

    Match your donation today

    EdSource has been on it when big shifts happen – like the Department of Education shutting down many areas of their work. But we also remain committed to following the long-term stories in our communities and having an impact through our reporting.

    Help us have an impact through data-driven, factual reporting. Your donation will be matched through June 11.





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  • Teachers! New York City Is Hiring to Reduce Class Sizes!

    Teachers! New York City Is Hiring to Reduce Class Sizes!


    Thanks to the tireless work of Leonie Haimson, Class Size Matters, and her hardy band of parent advocates, New York City is reducing class sizes to meet the requirements of state law. After 25 years of failed “reforms” like high-stakes testing, competition, merit pay, and choice, the city is finally embarked on a reform that has a solid research base and actually helps students. Teachers can devote more time to each students. Discipline problems will be less.

    New York City is hiring teachers!

    Ahead of a key deadline to reduce class sizes, New York City’s sprawling school system will spend upwards of $400 million as it races to fill 3,700 new teaching positions by the fall, new data shows.

    Under the state’s 2022 class size law, 60% of classrooms must comply next school year with caps between 20 and 25 students, depending on grade level. It’s expected to be the first time schools have to make real changes to abide by the regulation.

    To meet that benchmark, principals developed and had approved 741 school-specific plans in exchange for more funding. Schools Chancellor Melissa Aviles-Ramos and her deputies revealed during a City Council hearing on Tuesday that costs associated with those plans will top $400 million, paid for with a combination of state and city funds.

    While nearly all schools will use those dollars to bring on more teachers, some also expect to hire about 100 assistant principals or convert spaces into classrooms.



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  • California ranks bottom third in overall child well-being, per new report

    California ranks bottom third in overall child well-being, per new report


    LAUSD’s Nueva Vista Elementary School in Bell.

    Photo Credit: Betty Márquez Rosales

    California’s children rank in the bottom third of all states in overall well-being, according to a new report released this week.

    The authors of the report, “2024 KIDS COUNT Data Book: State Trends in Child Well-Being,” found that over half of California’s 3- and 4-year-olds are not in school, less than one-fourth of its eighth graders are proficient in math, and a greater number children and teens per 100,000 died than in previous years.

    “One way to think about it is where we see the most progress are the states who are investing in their children — heavily in their children,” said Leslie Boissiere, vice president of external affairs at the Annie E. Casey Foundation, who oversaw the compilation of the report.

    Now in its 35th year and published by the foundation, a private philanthropy and research organization, the annual report measures children’s well-being across 16 indicators within the categories of education, economic well-being, health, and family and community.

    Out of all states, California ranked 43rd in economic well-being, 35th in education, 10th in health, and 37th in family and community.

    California’s children fared better than most other states only in the health indicator. Even so, the number of babies with low birth-weight slightly increased from 7.1% in 2019 to 7.4% in 2022, as did the number of child and teen deaths, rising from 18 per 100,000 in 2019 to 22 per 100,000 in 2022.

    “The movement in indicators generally follows investments, and it depends on the particular state of how they’re investing in their children,” Boissiere said.

    This year’s report largely focused on comparisons between 2019 and 2022 data to provide a pre-pandemic and post-pandemic view of how children are faring, Boissiere said. Sources for the data included the U.S. Census Bureau, U.S. Department of Education, the National Center for Education Statistics, the National Assessment of Educational Progress, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

    Impact of low well-being on chronic absenteeism

    The authors noted that the report’s findings provide context to the conversation on chronic absenteeism, which is defined as missing 10% or more of the school year.

    The percentage of chronically absent students in California skyrocketed from the pre-pandemic rate of 12.1% in the 2018-19 school year to 30% in 2021-22. The reasons for such high absenteeism vary from district to district and even from student to student, but experts agree that the issue is exacerbated when children’s basic needs are not being met.

    “What we know is that it’s critically important that all children arrive in the classroom ready to learn and, in order for them to be ready to learn, their basic needs have to be met,” Boissiere said.

    National data included in the report highlighted the relationship between absences and academic performance. The more students miss school, the lower their reading proficiency.

    In 2022, the percentage of fourth-grade students nationwide scoring proficient at reading was 40% for students with zero absences in the month before they took the National Assessment of Educational Progress, or NAEP. Reading proficiency lowered to 34% with one to two absent days in that month; to 28% with three to four absences; 25% with five to 10 absences, and down to 14% for students who had more than 10 absences in the same one-month time frame prior to taking the NAEP.

    The authors also found that racial inequities play a critical role in nearly all the index measures in the report.

    “As a result of generations-long inequities and discriminatory policies and practices that persist, children of color face high hurdles to success on many indicators,” the authors wrote.

    For example, the authors found “alarming increases” in the rate of child and teen death rates among Black children nationally, and that American Indian or Alaska Native children “were more than twice as likely to lack health insurance.”

    Disaggregating racial demographic data also pointed to notable inequities.

    For example, authors found that Asian and Pacific Islander children experienced one of the lowest rates of poverty nationally at 11%; the rate of poverty among Burmese children was 29%, 24% for Mongolian children, and 23% for Thai children. The national average for child poverty is 16%, per the report, highlighting the stark poverty rates for many Asian children nationwide.

    Looking at distinct racial inequities, the authors found exceptions where children of color were faring better than the national average. For example, Black children were more likely to be in school at ages 3 and 4, to be insured, and to have a head of household with at least a high school diploma. Latino children and teens had lower death rates, and they were also less likely to have low birth-weight.

    “Today, kids of color represent a majority of the children in the country, as well as in 14 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands,” the authors wrote. “The future success of our nation depends on our ability to ensure all children have the chance to be successful.”





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  • New Policy! No Posts Today or Tomorrow!

    New Policy! No Posts Today or Tomorrow!


    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.



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  • California prepares to launch first phase of new education data system

    California prepares to launch first phase of new education data system


    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. 

    C2C could make state a data leader

    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.

    Cost of project unclear

    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.

    Sixteen partners to share data

    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.” 

    California is playing catch-up

    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.

    Public included in planning

    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.”





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  • New 2024-25 data released: California schools see ongoing enrollment decline

    New 2024-25 data released: California schools see ongoing enrollment decline


    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.

    Read more:

    Transitional kindergarten comes of age in California

    May 21, 2025

    Even as TK is set to become a real grade, just like any other K-12 grade, there are myriad challenges looming on the horizon, from finding qualified teachers amid a dire staffing shortage to how to ensure quality instruction and suitable facilities.

    Karen D’Souza





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  • My New Book is Now Available for Pre-Order on Amazon!

    My New Book is Now Available for Pre-Order on Amazon!


    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.

    Published by Columbia University Press..



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  • Summer school offers new teachers a chance to experiment

    Summer school offers new teachers a chance to experiment


    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!

    •••

    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.





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