Few people really understand the massive California school system accurately — even in "normal" times.

It's easy to think we understand how education works. After all, we lived through our own education, right? But a dose of humility is in order. The education system as a whole rarely changes much from one year to the next, but it has changed quite significantly since the Great Recession of 2008, and even more drastically since the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020. Even in ordinary times, myths and outdated ideas have a funny way of sticking around.

Ed100 exists to demystify the California school system. Let's start with the obvious: the system is really, really big.

There are sound reasons why this mammoth education system has to be particularly complex. Similar to Texas and Florida (and unlike, say, New York), California's population has grown and changed rapidly. The school system has had to grow and change with it.

Students have all kinds of different needs. To serve those needs and balance among them, the education system must be simultaneously massive and personal, which makes complexity unavoidable. To work for all students, it has to work for each student — even in a pandemic. That's a significant challenge.

Breaking it down

In California, about one student in five lives in poverty. About a fifth are learning English. Some kids come to school ready for kindergarten, but most don't. About an eighth have learning disabilities. All students need teachers that can teach complex material. And effective leaders. And access to the arts. Which takes money. And...

... and we're getting ahead of ourselves. Getting education right requires getting lots of things right at once. It's too much to think about everything simultaneously, so Ed100 breaks it down. It's easier to make sense of the system if you take it one topic at a time. Ed100 explains California's education system, busts myths, and explains what you need to know.

Wait, you might ask — do I really need to understand the system that governs California schools? Is it even possible? The answers are yes and yes.

Understanding the system is helpful for the sake of your own kids, of course, and the point of Ed100 is to make the system learnable. But there's something bigger: like it or not, you, as an involved parent or community member, are the heart of California's education accountability system. There is no independent watchdog in the system. You are it. The system literally depends on the vigilant support of local, active, informed constituents to speak up for what's right and what's needed.

To wield influence when you need it, you have to know what you are talking about. Ed100 can help with that.

California school results have improved a lot over the long term. But they are still pretty mediocre, and the pandemic hurt them.

Ed100's core content is a set of short lessons, including this one. (We have a blog, too, and a community toolbox.) You are reading Lesson 1.1, the first lesson of the first chapter. At the bottom of each lesson you will find a simple quiz that reinforces a main point. Pass a quiz and you earn a ticket (more about that in a moment); pass every quiz and you become an Ed100 Graduate.

You can do this. It's free, and it matters. If you complete all of the lessons you will become, in the words of one state leader, "intimidatingly well-informed." (She wasn't being tongue-in-cheek. Informed parents aren't easy to dismiss.)

Here's the main point of Lesson 1.1: California's K-12 educational results have improved a lot over the long term. But they are still pretty mediocre, and it's hard to argue that they have improved broadly in the last decade or so.

How can we tell if California schools are behind?

Schools serve many purposes, some straightforward and others hard to measure. Obviously, one of the central jobs of school is to help students learn facts and skills appropriate for their grade level.

Each year (with an exception in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic) some of America's 4th and 8th graders take tests for the "Nation’s Report Card." To eduation insiders, these tests are known as the National Assessment of Educational Progress, or NAEP. (It's pronounced "nape.")

Very few children actually take the NAEP tests.

Only a few hundred thousand children actually take the NAEP tests. These are not the tests that all students are required to take each year. (Those are called the CAASPP, or the "Smarter Balanced" tests.) NAEP is separate, and its purpose is purely statistical. Designed to be consistent from place to place and from year to year, it evaluates how well students know the basic academic content associated with their grade level. Scores on NAEP, though imperfect, enable researchers and policymakers to monitor the overall education system, comparing student achievement between years, states, grades, and student subgroups (for example by race, ethnicity, or socioeconomic factors like family income).

NAEP scores don't tend to change quickly. Frankly, almost nothing in the education system changes quickly. Scores bump up or down a point or two, but the best predictor of next year's score tends to be last year's score. It makes sense, right? The education system is like an armada of giant ships, each rowed by thousands of little oars. Each year the people rowing have a lot in common with those who rowed the year before.

The underlying currents surrounding a school community tend to change slowly, too. Books and tools might change a little. Teachers evolve their lessons, or move, or retire, or shift grades. But on the whole, change tends to happen slowly in each school system.

There are exceptions.

Nationally, NAEP scores dropped during the pandemic. School districts strained, with uneven success, to make access to technology universal. Teachers tried to figure out ways to make learning engaging at a distance. The pandemic also increased apprehension about standardized tests — especially the SAT and ACT. Even so, when we look back years from now it will be interesting to see whether the outcomes changed very much.

California's scores are low. And also ordinary.

California's children tend to score poorly on the NAEP tests. The chart below shows the overall rate at which groups of children in each state have scored at the level deemed proficient or better over time. (The chart averages fourth and eighth-grade math and reading proficiency rates.) California is represented by the thick orange line. (Massachusetts is the one on top. Hover over the chart for details. (Full model here.)

Unfortunately for California kids, these stubborn scores appear to matter. Education reporters often describe a ten-point difference in NAEP scores as representing about a year of learning. Some researchers dispute this rule of thumb, but if true, California's average students are years behind those in top-scoring states like Massachusetts. Meanwhile, California's less-advantaged students (those qualifying for free or reduced-price meals) are scoring a year behind less-advantaged students in Mississippi.

Why?

Perhaps these tests aren’t quite fair to California students. For example, administration of the test may vary a little by state. Some states provide extra testing time to English learners. Texas, for example, doesn't make students take the test if they are so new to English that they would bomb it. These small differences in administration probably matter a bit; small differences in state scores shouldn't be taken too seriously. Also, maybe the rule of thumb is wrong. Maybe ten points of difference on a NAEP test isn't equivalent to a year, but more like nine months. Or six. Anyway, tests don’t tell the whole story, right? There are many ways to measure success.

Year after year, the big picture is clear: California's students are behind.

These complaints miss the point. The fourth grade reading assessment evaluates whether children can read short passages and understand them. The math questions are similarly basic. Year after year, the big picture is clear: California's students are behind.

Does it matter if California children start off slowly, one might ask, so long as they catch up later? Unfortunately, most don’t. For many years, research has shown that children not reading at grade level by the end of third grade are at serious risk of never graduating from high school.

Are poor results somehow better for California, or for kids, if they can be “explained...?”

It's important to acknowledge that most of California's NAEP scores look less bad if you "disaggregate" them, comparing the scores of students with similar advantages and disadvantages. The Urban Institute helpfully shed light on this issue: "Comparing NAEP scores assumes that states serve the same students—and we know they don’t" (see the report America's Gradebook).

Yet another report, A Portrait of Educational Outcomes in California, suggested in 2019 that there was little difference between affluent districts in California and affluent districts nationally. “The disparity between California and the nation is concentrated in average and disadvantaged districts where California students score nearly a full grade level behind their national counterparts. These patterns are consistent when the same comparisons are made within each racial/ethnic group.”

So... blame the kids?

Wait, some might ask — does this mean California’s lackluster NAEP scores can be explained by demographics? This question begs another in return: should it matter? Are poor results somehow better for California, or for kids, if they can be "explained" by the state’s larger numbers of children of color and children in poverty? Is it useful to imagine it as their fault? If we want California to have a bright future, can we afford to accept demographics as an excuse for bad scores? Or are systemic inequalities at play here?

In any case, the data leave little room for denial. California’s children in poverty generally score starkly behind those in other states, as do California's Hispanic/Latino students. But California's white children aren't exactly leading the parade, either, and neither are California's better-off kids that don't qualify for the lunch program.

State-level results don't change quickly.

These results are not accidental or surprising. They do not tend to zigzag from one year to the next or change quickly in response to small changes in policy or practice. They are the long-term output of a large, complex system. In the 2022 NAEP results, California's ranking improved only because California scores dropped less than those as other states.

One important finding from the "Portrait" report mentioned above is that California's system has historically underperformed at each level. Gaps start early and tend to get worse, not better. This is a national challenge, and perhaps a global one, but California has an impressively bad record at addressing it.

Themes of Ed100

As you read Ed100, a few themes will emerge, like these:

Perhaps you found your way to Ed100 because you want to help make things better. There are many approaches to change, and we will explore them one by one. It's important to lay the groundwork first, so let’s broaden the context a bit. The next lesson examines how California compares not just to America, but to the world.

Scroll down just a little more to take the quiz for this lesson. Pass it, earn your ticket and keep going!

Updated December 2024