Increased spending on California public schools has not raised achievement. Here’s what’s next

The simple and inescapable fact is that for decades California’s public education system has been producing less than stellar outcomes for its 5.7 million students.

The latest nationwide tests of academic achievement reveal that in the two basic skills that kids need to progress further, reading and math, California students are in the lower tier of states. And proficiency rates among Black and Latino students still show “achievement gaps.”

For years, the education establishment — teachers, administrators and school boards — blamed a lack of adequate financing for California’s embarrassingly low levels of proficiency.

They had a point. But for the last 15 years, two governors, Jerry Brown and Gavin Newsom, and the Legislature have been beefing up financial support for schools and designating much of that money to be spent on closing the gap.

The 2026-27 budget adopted in June will spend $151 billion in state and local taxes on public education. Billions more will flow from Washington, raising per-pupil support to nearly $30,000.

A number of the state’s local school systems are in financial straits, with some — such as Sacramento City Unified — flirting with insolvency. But their plight is not caused by a lack of money but by habitual overspending in response to political pressure from school unions.

The statewide system also suffers from a political version of the old adage that too many cooks spoil the broth. An array of state and local officeholders divvies up the governance of schools, which means none of them is truly accountable for outcomes.

When parents or the media attempt to find out who’s really calling the shots, officials respond by pointing fingers at each other.

There was some progress on the governance front this year. In response to advice from a consortium of university education schools, Newsom and the Legislature agreed that having an elected state superintendent of schools is pointless and downgraded the office to an advisory role.

The Department of Education will be managed by a commissioner appointed by the governor, who also decides who sits on the state school board. It should mean, as Harry Truman once said of the presidency, that the buck of accountability for schools will stop at the governor’s office.

We’ll see whether that happens or if the next governor, most likely Xavier Becerra, tries to pass the buck.

What recently happened to three pieces of legislation dealing with education governance is not encouraging.

The California School Boards Association sponsored a package of bills aimed at making state government as accountable for education outcomes — particularly narrowing the achievement gap — as local school boards and administrators.

All four bills made it through the state Assembly, but three died in the state Senate without a vote or an explanation. The one that survived and may reach Newsom’s desk, Assembly Bill 2225, would create a six-member panel to devise a plan for improving education outcomes.

The death of the other three bills implies that legislative leaders are not ready for state government to be fully accountable, even though they are willing for the governor to have more authority.

California’s poor record on academic achievement in its public schools should be treated as an emergency — as important as a flood, tsunami, wildfire or earthquake.

But it has persisted, despite very sharp increases in per pupil spending — up 50% during Newsom’s governorship alone.

If anything, maintaining high levels of school funding will be difficult because the state has been running multibillion-dollar deficits in recent years, and deferring school aid has been one tool available to close budget gaps.