Event update: Registration for the Getting Down to Facts III 2026 Conference is presently at capacity. Thank you for your interest. About the Conference Co-hosted by Policy Analysis for California Education (PACE) and Stanford University’s SCALE Initiative, the Getting Down to Facts III 2026 Conference: Aligning Governance, Policy, and Capacity to Support Student Success Conference will bring together 250 state leaders, educators, researchers, and advocates to engage with new, policy-relevant research at a pivotal moment for California’s education system. What to Expect Building on the legacy

Join Susanna Loeb, Professor and Faculty Director of the SCALE Initiative at Stanford University, and a team of leading researchers for the official release of Getting Down to Facts III—a landmark, independent study on California’s education system. This webinar will unpack important findings from the research, highlight the challenges facing students and schools today, and outline a forward-looking vision for building a more effective and equitable system for the future. What You’ll Gain: A clear synthesis of key findings across the full research portfolio Practical insights on designing

Policy Analysis for California Education (PACE), California State PTA (CAPTA), and Youth Leadership Institute (yli) will co-host a youth-led gubernatorial forum on April 30, 2026 at the Fresno Convention Center. The evening will begin with a Civic Engagement Festival (4:00–5:30 pm) followed by the youth-led gubernatorial forum (5:30–7:00 pm). Together, these components will create a dynamic, youth-centered civic experience that elevates youth voice while directly connecting participants to pathways for ongoing democratic participation. Gubernatorial candidate and California Superintendent of

Newly appointed PACE Executive Director Lupita Cortez Alcalá will convene educators and community partners for a listening session on the current landscape of California’s P–16 education system. The discussion will highlight regional perspectives from the San Joaquin Central Valley and explore opportunities to strengthen alignment across educational systems through research, policy, and practice.

The PACE Annual Conference in January 2024 will bring together California policymakers, researchers, and education leaders to address critical questions about the state's public education system and explore transformative actions for improvement at all levels, from early childhood through higher education.

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. In this session, Carrie Hahnel (Bellwether) and Francis A. Pearman (Stanford Graduate School of Education) will discuss new research exploring the racial dimensions of school closures and how to address them.

Newcomer students have long been an underserved group in California’s school systems. Newcomers require specialized curricula and instruction to succeed in school as well as access to social services to meet even their basic needs. Unfortunately, most newcomers have not experienced schooling that adequately addresses their unique needs and drop out at a disproportionately high rate. There are thus significant opportunities to improve education for newcomers in California through policies, data systems, curricula, programs development, and collaborations.

Recent research from Policy Analysis for California Education, the Public Policy Institute of California, and the University of California, Berkeley Graduate School of Education has provided important insight into whether the LCFF is meeting its goal of improving equity in education and how it can be further refined to improve equitable funding, opportunities, and outcomes in California. Come join California State Senator Anna Caballero along with Children Now, Education Trust-West, Parent Revolution, Teach Plus, and PACE for a webinar exploring this important research.

What works to support students through the pandemic? How can the state and local districts best meet the needs of newcomer English Learners to California? What strategies can policymakers and district leaders implement to build bridges between a child’s early learning experiences and the early grades? Researchers, policymakers, and educators ask these kinds of questions all the time and yet making timely, effective connections between research, policy, and practice can seem like a herculean task.

The pandemic has introduced a great deal of hardship into many students’ lives, which may make it difficult for them to learn. Disruptions to students’ mental and emotional health, social systems of support, and learning environments require a new focus on social and emotional well-being. At the same time, pandemic-related school disruptions have put a heightened focus on the need to understand student learning. Measurement now is more critical than ever but requires new methods of assessing students and new approaches for analyzing and acting upon the data.

Districts across California are working on three discrete but related challenges as they address the impacts of COVID-19 on teaching on learning: 1) What do we do now to support student learning before school year ends; 2) What can we do in the Summer to mitigate the disparate impact of distance learning; and 3) What should we be designing for the Fall to best meet the needs of students, teachers and families. Expanded learning providers are critical partners for all three challenges.

This webinar will present findings from two forthcoming publications on community schools: the PACE brief “Community Schools: A Coronavirus Recovery Strategy;” and “Creating Strong Community Schools: The Role of California Counties in Providing Technical Assistance” by the Learning Policy Institute. The webinar will also feature perspectives from leaders at the school and county levels who will speak to what it takes to launch and sustain community schools.

The rapid onset of the health and economic crisis accompanying COVID-19 has presented an array of challenges for school districts and county offices across California. To aid in both local and state decision-making, PACE and Pivot Learning have been documenting promising practices at school districts in California. In this webinar, researchers and local superintendents will highlight how two districts initially addressed students’ immediate needs and how they are approaching strategic planning for the months ahead.

Join us for a conversation about education during COVID-19 including the challenges and opportunities ahead as schools and families prepare for a new academic year. What policies and practices can help ensure equitable and effective re-opening? What might learning and classrooms look like in the future?

The Brown Center on Education Policy at Brookings will host a webinar, featuring PACE Executive Director Heather J. Hough, addressing how the United States should approach reopening schools in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. Education experts will discuss options regarding the pace and sequence of reopening schools, how school practices will change to accommodate public health guidelines, and what schools should anticipate in the fall.

This webinar was the third in a three-part webinar series on special education featuring new research on the status of special education in California and paths forward for organizing schools to better support students with disabilities. This webinar will cover Differentiated Assistance, Multi-Tiered Systems of Support, Interagency Collaboration, and Lessons from Other States in Support of Students with Disabilities.

PACE’s annual conference brings together nearly 300 California policymakers, researchers, and education leaders to discuss new research and approaches to improving educational outcomes for California’s students, from early childhood through higher education.

The LCFF fosters accountability through districts’ use of LCAPs and District Dashboard metrics aligned to state priorities. The state’s new system of support is designed to assist districts whose Dashboard results have fallen short of expectations and is intended to advance both equity and excellence by helping districts shift from a culture of compliance to one of support and continuous improvement. CEOs play a key role in the system of support. In this seminar, PACE researchers will share new work on the changing role of COEs and lessons from early implementation of new structures.

Over the past 10 years, California's PreK-12 public school system has seen transformative changes in almost every arena, from academic standards and accountability to resource allocation through the funding formula. The Getting Down to Facts II project brought together over 100 of the country's top education scholars to examine these changes and assess our progress. The project's 36 studies focused on student success, governance systems, personnel issues, and school finance, and together, they can help build a common understanding of where we are that can be used to guide further improvements.

Education experts from PACE, LPI, and Opportunity Institute present a Plenary Session introducing CA’s education system to education scholars and leaders from countries around the world. They will discuss the historical roots of the many challenges facing CA’s schools and teachers, promising changes in the state’s education policy framework, and ongoing concerns about whether new policies will lead to meaningful improvements in the education policy framework, and ongoing concerns about whether new policies will lead to meaningful improvements in the education provided to CA students.

California supports the learning of 1.3 million English students and has the highest proportion of EL students in the nation. With the adoption of the California English Learner Roadmap by the State Board of Education and the passage of Prop 58, state support has grown for improved services. Consideration of the needs of the diverse EL student population is essential as it evolves at all education levels. In this seminar, PACE researchers present the needs of California's EL students, barriers to their success, and potential tools districts can use to support their EL populations.

Public school funding is a complex but vital area of interest in CA. In this seminar, the challenges of financing public education are highlighted in two areas: funding for facility maintenance and modernization, and special education for students with disabilities. CA’s vast inventory of school facilities vary widely in age and condition, and estimates for CA school facility maintenance and modernization over the next 10 years top $100 billion. With the advent of the LCFF, there has been increased focus on helping students with disabilities succeed in school but many districts lack funding.

Policy Analysis for California Education (PACE), will put the spotlight on education during the Gubernatorial Education Forum. Join this lively discussion, moderated by ABC7 Eyewitness News co-anchor Marc Brown, to learn more about each candidates’ vision for California’s public schools.

The Center on Education Policy, Equity and Governance ( CEPEG) & Policy Analysis for California Education ( PACE) invite you to a Policy Forum for Candidates for State Superintendent of Public Instruction.

PACE’s annual research and policy conference is the premier event for policymakers, researchers, advocates and local education leaders who are working to define and sustain a long-term strategy for comprehensive policy reform and continuous improvement in California’s education system. Our conference will focus on three key education policy issues: ensuring educational equity under the Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF), rethinking policy and practice in special education, and strengthening alignment between California’s pre–K and K–12 education systems.