Since the efforts to be made in education equity follow the entire student pathway, this guide seeks to advance a public dialogue about and action toward racial justice across the state's public schools, colleges, and universities. In supporting dialogue and action, this guide also seeks to model it. The model used is borrowed from the California…

California is at a crossroads. The state continues to battle a global pandemic, disproportionately affecting Black, Latinx, Asian, and Native American students. Meanwhile, communities of color are leading a movement to force the state's leaders to acknowledge the persistence of racism. However, rhetoric is not enough. On nearly every indicator,…

State legislators have the opportunity to create and support legislation that positions data as a tool to help decisionmakers at all levels take action to support student success. This checklist can serve as a guide to crafting legislation that addresses education data. It applies specifically to education data legislation which includes bills…

For over 5 years, The Education Trust-West's #Data4ThePeople campaign has been a statewide effort to ensure California builds a data system that is designed with achieving equity and the needs of students, parents, and families at the center. Now with school and college closures caused by COVID-19 posing a real challenge to data accessibility and…

In spring 2022, the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Educational Technology (OET) committed to advancing digital equity through the Digital Equity Education Roundtables (DEER) Initiative. Through DEER, OET hosted a series of national conversations with leaders from community-based organizations, as well as families and learners furthest…

Do employees at public colleges and universities have better retirement benefits than K-12 employees? This is the central question in the new report "Choice and Quality Among Retirement Plans for Educators." To answer this question, we evaluate the quality of higher education and K-12 retirement plans using five key variables: (1)…

California does not have a statewide data system that tracks student progress through K-12 and higher education and into the workforce. As a result, educators and policymakers cannot answer critical questions about student progress, which limits their ability to make evidence-based changes to support better and more equitable opportunities for…

The teacher workforce does not look much like the adult population or the students they serve. Across the country, only 21% of teachers are from historically disadvantaged racial groups compared to 35% of working-age adults and 49% of students. Simple math suggests that the diversity gap between students and teachers will only close when teachers…

Parents, students and school communities have been forced to respond to the COVID-19 crisis in unprecedented ways. What are their reactions to the responses by school districts and state officials to this crisis? How has this affected their feelings about state government and how are families faring as they face challenges like distance learning?…

This essay begins with a presentation of the author's personal and professional background relative to the topics of diversity, identity, socialization, and the inequality of educational outcomes. Turner then presents US census and Chronicle of Higher Education data to provide a national context for the discussion to follow, including but not…

This qualitative study employs a phenomenological research approach that examines the school counselor's experiences and training. The purpose of this study is to explore if school counselors received training in critical race theory (CRT), culturally sustaining pedagogies (CSP), and social justice (SJ), and if they implement these theories in…

Most Americans today need some education beyond high school to secure a well-paying job, and higher education is a key factor in social and economic mobility. But higher education is not accessible to all students. To further equalize opportunity, states must understand options for improving the way they fund higher education. America's public…

California has begun moving toward a "cradle to career" approach that connects early childhood, K-12, and higher education more closely. But COVID-19 has disrupted learning, funding, and progress toward improving student outcomes and has exacerbated racial and economic equity gaps. This publication is part of a briefing kit that focuses…

The Education Insights Center produced a series of reports culminating in recommendations for the structure and governance of a preschool through higher education and into the workforce (known as a P20W data system). This brief follows up on that series, with a focus on data quality; the brief was informed by the author's experience using…

This report examines findings from the 2020 PACE/USC Rossier poll of California voters. The poll represents the views of 2,000 registered California voters across a range of topics from early childhood education to higher education. Based on these results, the authors have identified five key findings: (1) There is growing pessimism about the…