Pursuant to California Education Code Section 84362, each community college district is required to allocate at least 50% of its annual education expenses, as defined by law, to the salaries and benefits of classroom instructors. This requirement ensures a significant portion of educational expenditures directly supports classroom instruction. The…

Despite extensive literatures documenting the importance of teacher diversity and teacher compensation, few studies explore relationships between the two. Fewer still examine effects of governmental accounting standards, even though these standards evolve regularly and could have substantial implications for how school districts allocate…

Our goal in this paper is to better understand public pension funding dynamics with a focus on sustainability and intergenerational equity. We examine the steady-state properties of deterministic models and simulations of stochastic models to illuminate the implications of recently proposed policies to alleviate current funding pressures. We close…

This report examines the demographic, educational, and employment characteristics (including compensation and benefits) of staff employed in center-based ECE [early care and education] programs throughout Marin County. The findings bring attention to the low wages and economic insecurity of the ECE workforce, particularly against a backdrop of one…

In 2013 California adopted a new watershed state finance policy, the Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) to drive more resources to students with higher needs, create more spending flexibility, and let districts decide how to spend substantial new dollars. Our analysis examines financial data from nearly all California school systems to clarify…

There is broad consensus that high-quality environments for young children depend on teachers who are skilled at nurturing their development and learning, yet low pay and inadequate working conditions routinely hamper teachers in their efforts to apply their skills and knowledge. This condition exists among teachers in early education as well as…

Policymakers know that improving teaching in our schools requires a systemic look at many policies related to educator effectiveness. For example, teacher preparation programs need to be dramatically improved and strengthened, but without accompanying reform in compensation, even highly effective and innovative schools of education are unlikely to…

A year ago at ASBO International's Annual Meeting and Expo in Seattle, Washington, school business officials from four states presented a powerful double-session panel on the status of changes in teacher contracts and educational funding in their regions of the country. The presenters have since updated their comments with new information and…

The tension at the heart of pension politics is the incentive to satisfy today's claimants in the here and now at the expense of long-term concerns. Teacher pensions, in particular, pose two challenges. The first is that political incentives invite irresponsible fiscal stewardship, as public officials make outsized short-term commitments to…

In the era of No Child Left Behind, principals are increasingly held accountable for student performance. But are teacher labor agreements giving them enough flexibility to manage effectively? This study answers this question and others. It examines how much flexibility school leaders enjoy on key dimensions of management in America's fifty…

In the midst of the global recession, how have national governments viewed the role of higher education in their evolving strategies for economic recovery? Demand for higher education generally goes up during economic downturns. Which nations have proactively protected funding for their universities and colleges to help maintain access, to help…

Sabbatical leave has a long and distinguished history in academe, both at universities and community colleges. By virtue of its traditional benefit to professors, institutions, and students, sabbaticals may appropriately be considered as a "right" by the professoriate. Even so, during statewide budgetary crises, sabbatical leave was…

RESULTS OF A 93-PERCENT RESPONSE TO QUESTIONNAIRES MAILED TO 68 COLLEGE PRESIDENTS ARE TABULATED AND COMPARED WITH COMMENTS AND SUGGESTIONS RECEIVED FROM THE EL CAMINO FACULTY. LITTLE STATEWIDE UNIFORMITY IN PRACTICES IS REPORTED, EXCEPT FOR A 71-PERCENT AGREEMENT ON THE USE OF 15 LECTURE HOURS AS A BASIC LOAD. COLLEGE SIZE AND AGE ARE NOT RELATED…

This report summarizes responses to a 5-page questionnaire sent to the heads of the 22 largest public junior college districts in California. The 100 per cent response rate included information on the following areas: (1) convention and conference attendance; (2) faculty rank; (3) sabbatical leave; (4) social security; (5) division and department…

This study was conducted to determine some aspects of the Sabbatical Leave Policy at a random sample of 23 California community colleges in order to compare the results to the policy at Southwestern Community College (SCC). Following a brief survey of research literature and a review of the sabbatical leave provisions of the California Education…