INITIATIVE

Policy Research Panels

Policy Research Panels

The PACE Policy Research Panel (PRP) is a collaborative approach to rapidly building and mobilizing knowledge on key topics that sit at the nexus of research, policy action and educational practice.  The PACE PRP assembles leading researchers, policymakers, and practitioners in the state to build and consolidate the knowledge base on what is known on high-priority education policy areas and make this knowledge more useable for education system leaders and policymakers who are tasked with designing programs and policies that shape the education of students in California.

In the year following the publication of Getting Down to Facts II, PACE heard from stakeholders in Sacramento and across the state that more knowledge on how to better serve students with disabilities was needed to guide policy and practice. The absence of practical knowledge on systems to support special education juxtaposed with the urgency that decisionmakers were placing on designing new special education policy made it well-suited as a topic of a PACE Policy Research Panel.

Over the past 10 years, California has made significant changes to its educational systems, including adopting new academic standards, transforming its approaches to funding and accountability, and shifting toward a more decentralized system of governance and finance. These shifts have been implemented with continuous improvement as the vision for California’s approach to advancing experiences and outcomes for students.