Coincidentally, both
The New Republic and
Time have major articles on California this week. In the former, John B. Judis paints a dark picture of K–12 education in the state. His fact-filled and regretfully pessimistic
"End State: Is California Finished?" notes that although in the 1960s California's schools were considered "among the best," with the fifth-highest spending per student and approximately half the state's high school graduates going on to college, at this point California's educational system has "fallen into disrepair."
Several dire statistics support his conclusion, including:
- In 2007, California eighth graders were forty-eighth among 50 states and the District of Columbia in reading and forty-fifth in math on the Department of Education's National Assessment of Educational Progress tests;
- California's spending per pupil is thirtieth among states;
- The state is forty-ninth in student-teacher ratios;
- California ranks fifty-first in guidance counselors and libraries.
Taking a broad view of the state's economic and political situations, Judis concludes that "California's poor performance since the 1960s may not have been due to an influx of bad teachers, or the rise of teachers' unions, but to the growth of the state's immigrant population after the 1965 federal legislation on immigration opened the gates."
He sees little hope for the state, whose best days seem long gone and unlikely to return. Yet despite everything, for many the California dream is as alive as ever, and
next week we'll take a look at a very different take on the Golden State.
