Since the state largely finances schools based on their attendance, many local districts are seeing ever-widening gaps between income and outgo, stalling what had been a decade-long pattern of increasing per pupil spending.
There is one other way for school officials to reduce their financial gaps: make it more difficult for charter schools to operate. As overall school finances are squeezed by the phalanx of interrelated issues, the battle over charter schools is becoming more intense. Earlier this year, after union-backed candidates achieved a majority on the board that governs the state’s largest school district, Los Angeles Unified, it cracked down on
This month, an even more direct assault on the charter school movement surfaced in the Legislature when the Senate Education Committee approved legislation, backed by the California School Boards Association and school unions, that would make it more difficult for new charter schools to gain approval.