Rebuilding Education in the Golden State

Nearly five years ago, in fall 1990, PACE issued a reform plan for California schools. The state's schools faced enormous challenges and, PACE then asserted, only a systematic, all-encompassing approach to reform could help meet students' diverse and growing needs. PACE acknowledged that California had taken some important steps toward education reform, but much remained to be accomplished.

The challenges PACE pointed to in 1990 have not abated. If anything, they have intensified. They revolve around three key issues: explosive growth, increasing diversity, and lagging student achievement.

Overcoming these challenges has been made all the more complex in an era of declining resources.

In the nearly five years since PACE issued its call for education reform, California has made modest progress on a number of fronts. But the state has not embraced a systematic, coordinated, comprehensive education change plan.

Thus, PACE is issuing an updated and revised Plan for California Schools.

In brief, PACE recommends that California

1. Develop a set of measurable statewide education goals: a set of expectations for students and a set of guideposts for teachers and administrators;

2. Develop, by September 1996, a new student assessment system to replace the CLAS test;

3. Provide incentives for a new teacher salary schedule based on demonstrated professional skill and knowledge;

4. Revitalize preservice and inservice teacher education to ensure that all California teachers meet a set of standards of professional competence;

5. Set as a goal that all California students achieve English proficiency, and provide resources—financial and pedagogical—so that local districts can achieve the goal;

6. Reform the state school finance system by restoring local fiscal control and revising the overly complicated system of categorical funding for programs;

7. Intensify and expand the coordination of services between schools and social service agencies begun with the Healthy Start initiative in 1991;

8. Streamline the education code and rigorously evaluate promising local reform efforts such as charter schools;

9. Encourage and support a well-designed set of experiments to test the hypothesis that enabling schools to make decisions about personnel, budget, instructional materials, hours of operation, and roles of adult staff will lead to improved student achievement; and

10. Formalize interagency cooperation and pass legislation to link school-to-career policy with education reform.