Lance T. Izumi with Matt Cox, Pacific Research Institute
August 2003
This report, the third in a series from PRI dating back to 1997, offers a comprehensive picture of K-12 education in California - and does so with admirable clarity and candor that will also interest reformers in other states. For example, it praises California's accountability system for aligning its tests with its standards but faults it for not including all schools, not holding students or individual teachers accountable, and not offering parental choice as a possible sanction. These are worthwhile issues that all states must address in their own accountability systems. The report also includes evidence supporting the benefits of phonics-based reading instruction, direct instruction, and English-immersion, and scolds the state for wasteful boosts in education spending (with few results to show for it), increases in violent crimes, and continued use of uniform salary structures for teachers - problems certainly not unique to California. It also supplies a wealth of data pertaining directly to California - from average teacher salaries (highest in the U.S.) to student performance on the SAT, NAEP, and state tests (the results are consistently poor). The full report runs 155 pages but includes a handy executive summary and highlights of each section. Find it at http://www.pacificresearch.org/centers/csr/index.html.
