Walters: Newsom wants to overhaul state oversight of California schools. Will students benefit?

Gov. Gavin Newsom dropped a brief and vaguely worded section into his State of the State address earlier this month, suggesting an overhaul of how California’s vast public education system is managed.

“It’s long overdue that we modernize the management of our educational system,” Newsom said, “and so in the budget I’ll be submitting tomorrow, I’m proposing that we unify the policymaking by the State Board of Education and the Department of Education, allowing the State Superintendent of Public Instruction to align our education policies from early childhood through college.”

The budget’s passage on this was longer, but still failed to explicitly say what Newsom had in mind.

The proposal cited two reports that bemoaned the multiple, often overlapping and sometimes competitive, state and local entities that govern the schools. One was California’s so-called Master Plan for Education, published in 2002, and the other was from Policy Analysis for California Education, or PACE, a multi-university think tank, that had been issued just weeks earlier.

The budget proposed to “move oversight authority of the management of” the state Department of Education and local districts under the California Board of Education.

Thus, without saying so directly, Newsom would strip the elected state superintendent of schools of managerial authority over the state Department of Education, relegating the officeholder to an ombudsman or advisor. Management would be vested in the Board of Education, which is appointed by the governor, and an appointed executive director.

“These changes will strengthen governance of California’s education system to provide coherence and meaningful accountability to address the needs of students, parents, teachers, school staff, and administrators,” the budget proposal declared.

The current superintendent, former state legislator Tony Thurmond, complained that he was not consulted about what would be a major overhaul of responsibility for a system that serves nearly 6 million students and is the largest single portion of the state budget.

“This governance proposal doesn’t establish any structures proven to move the needle on student outcomes,” Thurmond, who is running for governor, said, “and instead shifts authority to implement TK-12 education programs away from the official who California voters have elected to lead our state’s public schools.”

It’s apparent that Newsom’s administration had been laying the groundwork for the power shift — or power grab — long before the State of the State address. The PACE report issued in December was part of the process. It called for exactly what Newsom proposes.

“California’s education governance system is a complex network of agencies and entities designed to serve the most diverse and expansive TK-12 population in the United States,” the PACE report declared. “This system incorporates state, regional, and local levels of authority, each tasked with specific responsibilities and oversight. At its core, the structure seeks to balance statewide education goals with local control and accountability.

“However, its complexity often results in overlapping responsibilities, fragmented authority, and challenges in ensuring streamlined decision-making.”

PACE issued a statement backing the change from Michael Kirst, the state’s foremost academic authority on education and architect of the school finance overhaul, the Local Control Funding Formula enacted in 2012 under then-Gov. Jerry Brown.

Kirst called it “a new vision and a dramatic overhaul” that would address a 19th century governance structure.

“The lack of fundamental change since then has hindered education progress,” he said.

Politics aside, Newsom’s proposal would streamline governance that is now opaque and fragmented, and shields the system’s many points of authority from accountability. However, by vesting almost total authority in the governor and his or her appointees, it will be more difficult for a governor to escape accountability if educational achievement, which now languishes, doesn’t markedly improve.

Dan Walters is a CalMatters columnist.