Carrie Hahnel

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Carrie Hahnel
Senior Policy and Research Fellow,
Policy Analysis for California Education

Carrie Hahnel is senior associate partner for policy and evaluation at Bellwether and a senior policy and research fellow with Policy Analysis for California Education (PACE). Her research and policy expertise focus on school finance, school data, education accountability, and ways in which policies and systems can mitigate racial and socioeconomic inequities. She most recently served as senior director of policy and strategy with the Opportunity Institute and has also held positions as the deputy director for policy and research and interim co-executive director for The Education Trust–West and as research and evaluation director for the KIPP network of schools. She started her career in education as an AmeriCorps VISTA volunteer and has also worked as an arts education advocate. She received her BA from Carleton College and her MEd from the Harvard Graduate School of Education.

updated 2021

Publications by Carrie Hahnel
Declining student enrollment is leading to a loss of revenue in many California school districts. To address ongoing budget shortfalls, many districts have consolidated or shuttered schools,and others are contemplating doing so. A new report and…
Enrollment in California public schools has been declining and is projected to fall even more steeply during the next decade. Because funding for school districts is largely based on average daily attendance rates, a decline in enrollment results in…
Trade-offs and Policy Alternatives for California
The method California uses to count students for funding purposes is an important decision that drives both resources and behaviors. For more than 100 years, California has funded school districts based on the average number of students who attend…
California enacted a groundbreaking shift to its school-funding system when it passed the Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) in 2013. The law sought to make funding more equitable and also aimed to increase local control based on the premise that…