The COVID-19 pandemic posed many challenges to student learning, classroom instruction, and the management of school systems. Media, think tanks, and education groups have warned of a post-COVID fiscal cliff for K-12 schools after the $190 billion from the federal government in the form of the Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief…

When K-12 schools in California closed for in-person instruction in response to COVID-19 in March 2020, few would have predicted that most schools would remain physically closed for more than one year. Throughout this period, California's educators and students have continued teaching and learning remotely for the most part, demonstrating…

While school officials are grappling with how to bring students safely back to classrooms during a pandemic and provide them with a quality education, educators and the public are demanding that schools find remedies for systemic educational inequities. How can education leaders keep equity at the center of their own practice and in their…

To align their financing strategies and fundraising efforts with their fiscal needs, charter school leaders need to know how much funding they need and what that funding will support. This cost estimation tool offers a simple set of worksheets to help start-up charter school operators identify and estimate the range of costs and timing of…

This guide is designed to help school districts develop a consolidated plan for programs and resources. It outlines the importance of generating a consolidated plan to reduce duplication, identify children's needs, and coordinate funds from various programs. Consisting of 10 modules, the guide addresses all components of the planning process and…

This paper argues for increased universitywide research planning, with emphasis on collective identification of priorities, open communication at all levels, careful allocation of resources, and long-range strategic planning. (DB)

Public pressure for expansion of secondary and higher education has forced governments of several developing countries to urgently seek ways to meet this demand. Many of these countries have been hard hit by debt and high world interest rates. At their 1984 conference, Commonwealth Ministers of Education requested the Secretariat to examine ways…

School district budgeting is a daunting process. To help administrators, board members, and teachers who are not as knowledgeable on the subject as they feel they need to be, a practical manual on the budget-development process is offered here. Three themes are established early in the book: "budgeting is planning"; "administration in budgeting is…

Currently, 30 California community colleges have adopted flexible calendars, which permit up to 15 of the 175 days of legally required faculty service to be used for authorized non-instructional activities. A broad range of flex activities are authorized under Title V of the State Education Code, including staff development or in-service training,…

This manual covers the fundamentals of managing student activities, including program management, budget guidelines and cost-cutting methods, and ways to gain support for the student activities program. General advice is provided in the opening section on initial assessment of program options, setting priorities, and resource allocation. The…

This document offers administrators a concise approach to the various theories of total quality management (TQM) and the tools necessary to implement these theories at postsecondary educational institutions. The book is divided into four chapters. Chapter 1 introduces the principles of TQM by briefly: (1) reviewing the ideas of TQM leaders; and…

This paper examines some general principles affecting the timing, extent, and direction of fiscal changes in public school finance systems. To develop a framework that is applicable to a wide variety of states, the analysis concentrates on two dimensions: allocation and distribution. The median voter model and the fiscal neutrality model of state…

Needs assessment, a procedure for obtaining and analyzing information for use in decision-making, consists of identifying the concerns of faculty, staff, parents, students, and community, and validating these concerns (which only then become "needs") by means of information derived from surveys and school records. The Worldwide Needs…

Projections in this document form the basis of the site-based budget planning process for schools in the Seattle (Washington) School District. These projections are based on the Weighted Student Formula approved by the School Board in February 1997. The Weighted Student Formula is based on three principles: (1) resources follow the student; (2)…

This paper addresses the problem of shaping new strategies in the face of current enrollment declines at many colleges and universities. It describes an approach that applies a long term planning model that can incorporate the short-term realities of lower enrollments and budget constraints with projections for new strategic initiatives. The paper…