California’s 6 million students will feel the impact of how well LCFF is implemented (photo credit: Matthew Grant Anson)
Collaboration is the cornerstone of good government. It can improve governance, deliver better results, and improve our state as a whole.
California Forward announced that it is working with the California School Boards Association to help our state’s school boards implement the Local Control Funding Formula. LCFF, the landmark school funding law signed last year by Governor Brown, is the ambitious attempt to reform the way our schools are funded by putting more control over the money in the hands of those directly affected: the school boards and districts themselves.
“California is too large, too diverse and too complex to solve community and regional problems at the state level,” said CA Fwd president and CEO Jim Mayer. “California Forward is pleased to partner with CSBA because LCFF is a unique and rare opportunity for local governance to take the wheel on deciding what’s best. If LCFF is implemented effectively, we stand to not only have better educated students but even more evidence that empowering local governments is the way to improve services and deliver better results.”
The fruits of this work between CA Fwd and CSBA will be immediate; the first workshop began Feburary 26th in Chico, with nine more workshops scheduled every few days up and down the state throughout the rest of February and March. Together, CA Fwd and CSBA will address the approved LCFF regulations, LCAP template, best practices for engaging local stakeholders, and alignment with other programs.
The Local Control Formula is an example of true government reform affecting perhaps the most important Californians of all; our 6 million school-age children. Just as our kids needed help making their first steps before they could run, providing as much information, resources, and assistance as possible to our districts is key to making sure the opportunities of local control that come with LCFF are realized in full.
The work with the California School Boards Association symbolizes CA Fwd’s commitment to these types of reforms, but these workshops aren’t just symbolic – these are proactive steps toward making the law work as well as possible.
