Community college students must navigate complex financial aid policies and procedures to obtain their aid award. In this study, I investigated how Students of Color at a community college experience financial aid disbursements. Through qualitative interviews, I found that community colleges disburse aid to students through a process I define as…

Early care and education (ECE) programs can provide a lifetime of benefits to children and families, but a lack of public support leaves these valuable services vulnerable to collapse during economic downturns. The COVID-19 pandemic was a particularly intense emergency for ECE providers: closures due to illness or shelter-in-place ordinances…

This study examines how five diverse California elementary schools--two underperforming and three high achieving, with statistically significant subgroups of English Learner, socioeconomically disadvantaged, and minority students--have allocated resources to improve student achievement. The applied research contributes new information to the…

This study seeks to extend the literature on higher education enrollment patterns during times of recession by examining patterns of enrollment and successful course completion in one of the world's largest higher education systems--the California Community College system. The data are drawn from publicly available data sources on the web. CCC…

This study selected a purposeful sample of eight high performing southern California elementary schools which achieved API scores above 900 over a three year period. A review of instructional strategies for each study school during the improvement process and resource allocation patterns was determined. Case studies of each school include…

Zero-base budgeting is presented as the functional alternative to the community college funding crisis which may be precipitated by passage in June 1978 of the Jarvis Amendment (Proposition 13) in California. Defined as the management of scarce resources on a cost/benefit basis to achieve pre-determined goals, zero-base budgeting emphasizes…

While much attention has been paid to educational reform or restructuring efforts to improve the nation's schools, the fiscal aspects of reform have received little attention. The Education Commission of the States studied 20 school districts in 6 states (California, Colorado, Illinois, Kentucky, Maine, and South Carolina) to determine what impact…

This speech examines the paradoxical issue of why, while higher education is making great strides and contributions, it is also in great peril, particularly concerning resource allocation and the more effective utilization of those resources. Included as evidence of higher education's contributions are greater access, greater outcomes in terms of…

A study examined the methods used by several California school districts to respond to educational retrenchment. Results showed that, while respondents had difficulty separating recent educational legislaton from other aspects of retrenchment, they agreed that there was no way to produce better results in education with a reduction in resources.…

This report describes the procedures employed in the preparation of a list of courses to be deleted from the credit and noncredit programs of the California community colleges in response to a $30 million deduction from the total community college apportionments. The first section presents background on the 1982-83 budget bill, specifies three…

This report reviews actions taken by the Board of Governors and the Chancellor's Office of the California Community Colleges to implement the 1982-83 Budget Act's $30 million reduction in state apportionments for the community colleges. First, background material specifies the options provided by the legislature to effect the savings, including…

Currently, 5-to 10% of beginning students do not speak English. It is time to end the bilingual education versus English-only debate and explore how improved instructional strategies can improve either approach. Promising strategies include instructional time extension, cooperative learning, peer tutoring, and California's newcomer programs. The…

A review is provided of the major fiscal, historic, and management issues influencing the debate about community college finance and governance in California. The report begins with a brief discussion of the major points of difference between the funding mechanisms for the community colleges and for the state's two public university systems. These…

This report describes the effects of the recession in the early 1990s on institutions of higher education in California including large budget cuts, student tuition increases, enrollment reduction of 200,000, growth in student loans, and lack of state policy. This report recommends that a new compact between the state, the colleges and…