Technical Reports
Early Childhood Education - Section 1: The Changing Landscape of ECE in California
This report examines how universal prekindergarten expansion is reshaping early childhood education in California. It considers what expanded access means for families, providers, capacity, and the broader mixed-delivery system.
Early Childhood Education - Section 2: Staff Preparation & Support
This report examines preparation and professional support for early childhood educators. It identifies opportunities to strengthen quality and consistency across early learning settings.
Early Childhood Education - Section 3: The ECE Workforce
This report analyzes the early childhood workforce. It highlights how compensation, credentials, retention, and career pathways shape the quality and stability of early learning programs.
Early Childhood Education - Section 4: Quality Assessment & Monitoring
This report examines how California monitors early childhood program quality. It asks how the state could build a better system to assess and support improvement in the quality of children’s learning experiences across settings.
Early Childhood Education - Section 5: P-3 Instructional Continuity
This report examines alignment from preschool through third grade. It identifies ways to create a more coherent early learning pathway across standards, curriculum, assessment, and teacher preparation.
Early Childhood Education - Section 6: Data & Data Systems
This report reviews California’s early childhood data systems. It considers how better-integrated data could help the state understand access, quality, workforce conditions, and child outcomes; and make more informed decisions about its investments.
Who Benefits from Public PreK Expansions & Increased K-5 Spending? Dynamic Complementarity in California’s Education Policies
This report shows how California's investments in CSPP, TK, and elementary school spending delivered substantial, equity-enhancing gains in student achievement, and their effects reinforce one another across the preschool and early elementary grades. The results suggest that sequenced public investments in educational opportunity can produce developmental multiplier effects that exceed the sum of their independent effects.
California Schools’ Revenue Sources and Constraints
This report explains how California’s revenue structure shapes school funding adequacy, equity, and reliability. It helps clarify why funding levels, revenue volatility, and local constraints matter for districts’ ability to plan and support students.
California's School Facilities in a Changing Climate: Funding, Equity, and Resilience
This report examines school facilities funding, climate resilience, and equity. It highlights how buildings, outdoor spaces, and local fiscal capacity shape students’ learning environments.
District Dollars 3: Recent Patterns in California School District Finances, Trends in Teacher Compensation, and Within-District, Between-School Spending
This report analyzes recent trends in California district finances at a moment when school revenues have grown substantially. It shows how rising costs for special education, employee benefits, and retiree obligations shape what districts can do with new resources.
Pensions and California Public Schools, 2026
This report analyzes how rising pension costs affect California school district budgets. It shows how obligations from the past can shape the resources available for current students, staff, and programs.
The Fiscal Consequences of School Closures in California: Evidence from a Statewide Synthetic Difference-in-Differences Design
This report examines whether school closures improve district finances. It offers evidence to inform more careful decision-making as districts respond to enrollment decline and community change.