Public education is a state responsibility, carried out locally.

The Constitution doesn’t dictate how public education in America ought to work. In fact, it doesn’t even mention it, because at America’s birth, public education didn’t exist.

Through a combination of laws, court decisions, and tradition, each state has gradually defined its own ways to organize schools, especially through local school districts and charter schools. It’s a complex system that touches a lot of lives.

This post explains what school boards in California do, what they don’t do, and why. It reviews the significant but limited powers of school boards, how people come to serve on them, and what it takes to do the job well. There are reasons why school board procedures and interactions can feel scripted and legalistic; this post explains those reasons and suggests ways to address them.

This post is part of a series about school boards.

What is a school board?

In California, a school board is a small group of people with the collective authority to make certain kinds of decisions and policies in the context of a school district, charter school, or other Local Education Agency (LEA).

People who serve on these boards can be known as school board members or trustees. In most cases, they must reside in the district they serve. In most large school districts, board members may represent only the geographic trustee area where they reside and were elected rather than the district as a whole.

Nearly every California school district and county office of education belongs to the California School Boards Association (CSBA), a voluntary membership organization funded by dues. CSBA provides training, model policies, legal and governance resources, and advocates for school boards in Sacramento.

A school board’s policies are only meaningful if implemented effectively. In training for board members, CSBA encourages them to think of the board and the superintendent as a governance team.

Charter school governing boards in California set policies for their governance as part of their charter agreement with the school district that authorizes them. Few, if any, charter governing boards participate in CSBA; instead, they turn to the California Charter Schools Association (CCSA) and/or the Charter School Development Center (CSDC) for advice and advocacy.

What’s the difference between the school board and the Superintendent?

Ed100 Lesson 7.3
School districts in California

In most school districts, the board has just one direct employee: the district Superintendent. School boards do not make day-to-day decisions about the operation of a school or district — that’s the superintendent’s job.

The scope of a school district superintendent’s responsibility is broader than that of the CEO of a business of comparable size. The superintendent manages the people who work for the district, including its school principals, teachers, the central office, and those who care for school facilities. In addition to hiring and managing staff, the superintendent negotiates contracts, ensures that the district complies with state and federal laws, works with community partners and represents the district in disputes.

School boards hire their superintendent and, occasionally, fire them. Superintendents generally have multi-year contracts. Like CEOs, they are paid serious money.

What are a school board’s duties?

School boards are broadly responsible for the learning and well-being of each student in the district’s care.

They are also collectively responsible for specific actions including these:

• Evaluating and hiring or firing the Superintendent;
• Ensuring the financial health of the district through the budget process;
• Opening and closing schools;
• Approving the district’s annual three-year plan (LCAP);
• Proposing taxes to pay for school facilities through local school bonds;
• Approving contracts including collective bargaining agreements;
• Approving payment of damages in legal settlements;
• Approving curriculum choices. This authority can have a huge impact on learning, and few board members have expertise in it. Some districts have experienced major conflicts over policies to ban books.

Typically, boards form committees in order to work effectively with the school district on specific topics. Common examples include financial oversight or bond oversight, District English Learner Advisory committee service, facilities, and curriculum.

The list above is not complete for a good reason. In 1972, California voters gave school districts broad authority to innovate without seeking prior permission beyond their school board. This power, known as the state’s permissive education code, passed as Prop. 5 (1972) with 59% of the vote.

How much power does an individual school board member have?

Acting alone, an individual board member has little formal power. The board’s authority is collective.

When they meet or act together, members of boards in California must do so in ways that are formal and public. Actions must be proposed, discussed and approved using standard rules of order (such as Robert’s Rules or Rosenberg’s Rules). The most important rules are defined in the Brown Act.

What is the Brown Act?

California’s open meeting law for local government bodies is known as the Brown Act. Passed by legislators in 1953 and refined by voters in Prop. 59 (2004), it defines the major procedural rules that guide and constrain board members.

The public’s business should be conducted in public.

The Brown Act’s basic principle is simple: the public’s business should be conducted in public. The devil, as they say, is in the details. School board members regularly attend training to understand the implications. Watch this overview — it’s a little dated but good.

Here are the main things to know:

• Meetings are open. The public may generally attend without being required to identify themselves or explain why they are there. Recording meetings is generally permitted.
• The agenda is public in advance. For a regular meeting, a written agenda generally must be posted at least 72 hours in advance, describing what the board expects to discuss or act upon. With limited exceptions, the board cannot take action on something that wasn’t properly placed on the agenda.
• The public gets a chance to speak. At regular meetings, members of the public must have an opportunity to comment on matters within the body’s jurisdiction, as well as on specific agenda items before or during their consideration. Boards may impose reasonable, generally applicable time limits.
• Criticism is protected. A board cannot prohibit public criticism of the agency’s policies, programs, services, actions, or omissions. That doesn’t mean speakers can disrupt the meeting; reasonable rules for orderly conduct still apply.
• Board deliberation generally must happen in public. Members cannot evade the law by using private conversations, emails, intermediaries, or other “serial meetings” to develop a collective concurrence outside a public meeting. (See below for more about that.)
• Closed sessions are exceptions, not an alternative way of doing business. The law permits confidential discussion of specified matters—for example, certain personnel matters, litigation, labor negotiations, and real-estate negotiations. The agenda must identify the legal basis for the closed session, and some actions taken there must subsequently be reported publicly.
• Meeting materials generally belong in public view. Writings distributed to all or a majority of the board in connection with an open-meeting agenda item generally must also be available to the public.

The Brown Act applies to K–12 school boards, community college district boards, as well as other public meetings.

What is a serial meeting violation?

The Open Meeting law involves two public rights that mesh imperfectly. On one hand, the public has a right to raise new issues to the board through public comment. On the other hand, the public has a right to know in advance what topics will be discussed.

Protecting both rights often means the board cannot immediately discuss what a member of the public has just asked it to discuss. If it does, it can create the basis for legal complaints and headaches down the road.

A related constraint is commonly known as the serial meeting problem. Members of a board have to be careful about the circumstances under which they discuss board business, and who is “in the room” when the discussion happens. Separate conversations with constituents or staff can add up to the legal equivalent of an unannounced meeting in violation of the Brown Act. The video linked above introduces some of the complexities. This brief video reinforces important points.

Can a school board raise taxes for schools?

The short answer is no, at least not directly. Context matters.

Operational funding.

Prior to 1972, school boards in California had direct power over the operational funding of schools because they controlled local property tax rates, which at the time was the main source of funding for K-12 education. It was an unfair system that favored the wealthy and did nothing for kids in poor communities.

The California Supreme Court ruled the system unconstitutional in the landmark Serrano v. Priest decision. Today, property tax rates in the state are capped by Proposition 13. More than 95% of students in the state attend schools in districts that rely at least partly on state income taxes, apportioned under the Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF).

As explained in Ed100 Lesson 8.9, districts have few options for raising money outside this system. The most notable option, a local parcel tax (Lesson 8.10), is notoriously difficult to pass because when a school board places such a tax on the local ballot it requires two-thirds approval from local voters. The state Supreme Court has clarified that communities have the right to tax themselves with a majority vote if the measure originates as an initiative.

This local right could disappear if Prop. 43 (2026) passes.

Facilities funding

Communities depend on local school districts to make decisions about capital funding for school facilities. As explained in Ed100 Lesson 5.9, state and federal sources contribute little money toward facility upkeep and renovation — it’s mostly up to local communities to tax themselves.

With a vote of 55%, local communities can sell bonds, taking on debt to improve or replace facilities. Doing so comes at a price, of course — money spent repaying bond loans and interest comes at the expense of teacher salaries and other priorities. School boards decide whether and how to ask voters for this kind of loan.

Who can serve on a school board, and how are members elected?

There aren’t many basic requirements to serve on a school board. You must be at least 18, a resident of the district, and a registered voter. A district employee cannot simultaneously serve on that same district’s board; the employee must leave the job before being sworn in.

Many districts are geographically divided into trustee areas, with each board member elected only by voters who reside in that area. In these by-trustee-area systems, voters have no say over other board seats. This system has become increasingly common, in significant part because of a changed interpretation of the California Voting Rights Act.

Most school boards have five members, but large unified school districts generally have seven. Small elementary districts might have just three.

Generally, school board members in California are elected and serve four-year terms. When there are vacant positions, a board can appoint members to serve out the term.

Charter schools work differently. The school’s charter and governing documents establish how board members are selected. In many charter schools, existing board members appoint or elect their successors.

Can students serve on school boards?

Yes. The highest public office a student can hold in California is a seat on the State Board of Education. It is a full voting position, with authority equal to all the other members.

California school districts with high school students ought to include students on their boards, and must do so if students petition for representation. Student board members, sometimes known as student delegates, cast preferential votes that are non-binding but recorded in minutes. The board may also authorize student delegates to make motions.

The identities of board members are public information in California; this suggests that districts ought to include their student board member(s) on their roster, but as of 2026 this practice remains fairly rare. In practice, student board members are mostly not listed in a way that would allow constituents to connect and collaborate with them.

To help student board members learn what they need to know to serve effectively, school boards should consider encouraging student delegates to earn their free certificate as an Ed100 Graduate. Better yet, districts should arrange for timely training through a special summer session of the CSBA Masters in Governance program (MiG). The annual CSBA convention is held in December, too late in the school year to serve effectively as a training opportunity.

Prepared student leaders don’t magically appear. Districts can and should develop a pipeline of well-prepared future student board members. One place to start is to provide training for students who step up to serve on Schoolsite Councils. Programs run by CASC and GENup have a strong history of impact.

What is the civic role of a school board?

In civics class, students learn about the three branches of government. It seems tidy, right? Too tidy. The system that governs their schools is considerably more tangled.

In California, a school board combines elements of all three branches. Consider student discipline: the board adopts policy like a legislature, oversees its implementation by the superintendent and staff like an executive, and may ultimately sit in judgment over whether a particular student should be expelled — a quasi-judicial role.

To help local boards manage their work across these roles, the California School Boards Association (CSBA) has developed GAMUT, an online board-management system. Its policy service includes more than 650 sample board policies, administrative regulations, bylaws, and related legal references. Districts tend to adapt these samples to their local needs rather than write policies from scratch.

For example, CSBA provides sample policies on student conduct (BP 5131), discipline (BP 5144), and suspension and expulsion (BP 5144.1). The numbering system is widely consistent across California districts.

Board policies can be written flexibly, leaving room for district staff to develop more specific administrative regulations (AR). In GAMUT, these regulations usually share the same number as the board policy they relate to. For example, regulations related to discipline are frequently codified as AR 5144.

How much are school board members paid?

Service on a school board is a big job with minimal support. A job with a conventional schedule makes it hard to visit schools while they are in session. Evening meetings are common.

Compensation for board members is up to each board to decide, within limits. In 2026 these limits increased for the first time in 41 years. The maximum varies according to the size of the district. For trustees serving districts with 1,000-10,000 students it is $1,200 per month.

Some school districts allow trustees to participate in district health and welfare plans. Depending on the district, coverage may be partly or fully paid by the district, or by the trustee. Examples of districts with historically generous coverage include LAUSD and Bakersfield.

Trustees must disclose potential financial conflicts. Each year, school board members file a public Statement of Economic Interests, known as Form 700, identifying financial interests that could potentially conflict with decisions they make as trustees.

How does a school board steer the district?

School boards don’t run districts, but they can set direction by clarifying what the district should aim to accomplish, putting policies and resources behind those priorities, and then paying attention to whether they are working.

Set measurable goals. What should improve, for which students, and by how much? In California, the Local Control and Accountability Plan (LCAP) should be an important part of this process. Districts identify goals, actions and measures of progress, with required community engagement along the way.

Choose the levers. Boards have substantial authority, but real results are the cumulative outcome of what happens in each classroom each day. Board choices determine what the district prioritizes and where it puts its money and attention.

Watch the results. Governing also means asking whether those choices are producing the intended results. The California School Dashboard is a prominent public place to look for evidence, but by the time the results appear there, they are already old. To keep a pulse on results, boards need other sources, including direct contact with constituents.

Ask what works. It’s fairly easy to track whether money was spent or a program was implemented. More important questions require research. Did an investment in tutoring improve learning, and if so how and for whom? How did an attendance initiative reduce chronic absence? Are results improving for the students the board intended to help? Useful governance connects expenditures and programs to outcomes and uses the answers to adjust goals, policies and budgets.

Board members or prospective members should be aware of research about board service released in 2026 in association with the Getting Down to Facts III project. In particular, the research found that districts strongly tend to set wishy-washy goals that can’t be measured:

How can I influence my school board?

Despite the sobering research above, the annual process of approving the LCAP (the district’s three-year plan) remains the most promising formal mechanism for influencing change in a district’s priorities. Districts are required to hold meetings to seek feedback about the LCAP during the drafting process. These meetings are often poorly attended. If you have read your LCAP and have specific ideas for change, you can have an impact.

LCAP documents are usually lengthy and dull. Many LCAPs are toothless or vague, but they don’t have to be. In the process of approving the LCAP, the board has the power to insist on changes. It's important to make the changes as early in the process as possible, however, because the district can incur fines if it files late.

In the end, of course, the most powerful way to make a difference in a school board is to serve on it. There’s a lot to know about running for school board, so do your homework!

This post, originally by Denise Jennison, was significantly updated and extended by Jeff Camp in October 2026.