Notations On Our World (Special Thursday Edition): On Education.....

We attended the last Board meeting of the Capistrano Unified School District on December 6, 2017 as deliberations ensued about the challenges teachers face in light of the funding mechanism known as the Local Control Funding Formula.    It underscores the profound challenges faced by Public Education.

As California is our home state, we have a keen interest in all that happens here.  What happens in California always has National Implications.    Education is no exception as we are pleased to report on the latest on California Education courtesy of EdSource:

Podcast: This Week in California Education

This week we focus on Gov. Brown's push to establish a new online-only community college. His proposal has generated both interest and controversy. November 30 was the deadline for submitting alternative strategies to the governor for how to establish the online college he has in mind. EdSource executive director Louis Freedberg talks with California Community Colleges Chancellor Eloy Ortiz Oakley about the online college, and the huge population of "stagnant workers" it is aimed at. Also, Jory Hadsell, executive director of the Online Education Initiative of the California Community Colleges, talks about why online classes work better for several categories of students -- and the 700,000 community college students who are already taking online courses. In a major development this coming week the California Department of Education is expected to finally release the California School Dashboard which has been under development for several years. EdSource Editor-At-Large John Fensterwald talks with Josh Daniels of the California Collaborative for Educational Excellence about how the new support system will work. Listen Now Edsource was also "on the prowl" with this on the Local Control Funding Formula underscoring how Governor Brown had basically One Year to get it done or else with ideas to get it done: Jerry Brown's dilemma: fix school funding formula now or watch others do it later By John Fensterwald, EdSource If he chooses, Gov. Jerry Brown can leave office a year from now with the satisfaction of seeing the Local Control Funding Formula, the sweeping school funding and improvement reform he championed, intact and fully funded — at least as the 2013 law defines full funding. Read more