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Childhood obesity has risen and is one of the most important global problems of our time, and school physical education programs are the key to ameliorating it. In American schools, physical fitness scores have declined; yet, global, national, state, and local concerns for the overall health, physical fitness, and wellbeing of children are at an all-time high. The lack of safe and affordable options for physical activity coupled with the significant decrease in physical activity rates among most American children underscores the need for programs, data, and research on physical fitness in schools, where children spend a significant amount of their time. The purpose of this brief research report is to call the federal government and states to mandate physical fitness programs and to increase data collection capacity on physical fitness in schools. Subsequently, this study asks researchers to study physical fitness in schools in the U.S. to increase its importance to policy makers and educational stakeholders and advance our understanding of educational inequities in school physical fitness. As an example, using descriptive analyses, we have provided policymakers, educational stakeholders, and researchers with a first look at California's physical fitness data which shows how our findings complement prior literature as well as extend them. Implications for the research and practice are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

State finance reforms have raised per-pupil spending and elevated the achievement of disadvantaged students over the past half-century. But we know little about how fresh funding may alter teacher staffing or the social and curricular organization of schools, mediating gains in learning. We find that US$1.1 billion in new yearly funding—arriving to Los Angeles high schools after California enacted a progressive weighted-pupil formula in 2013—led schools to rely more on novice and probationary teachers. Schools that enjoyed greater funding modestly reduced average class size and the count of teaching periods assigned to staff in five subsequent years. Yet, high-poverty schools receiving higher budget augmentations more often assigned novice teachers to English learners (ELs) and hosted declining shares of courses that qualified graduates for college admission. Mean achievement climbed overall, but EL and poor students fell further behind in schools receiving greater funding. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Can equity policies foster success and close the outcome gaps experienced by racially minoritized students in community colleges? Using a critical policy analysis and equity-mindedness framework, we examine whether and how the design and early implementation of one such policy—the California Community Colleges' Student Equity Policy—addresses racial equity. Findings show that attention to race and racial equity diminished over time in state policy documents, and varied widely in colleges' response to the policy, suggesting that its potential to tackle racial inequities is so far unexploited. Implications are discussed and recommendations for policy, practice, and research are proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Education Policy Analysis Archives / Archivos Analíticos de Políticas Educativas / Arquivos Analíticos de Políticas Educativas is the property of Educational Policy Analysis Archives & Education Review and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Education Policy Analysis Archives / Archivos Analíticos de Políticas Educativas / Arquivos Analíticos de Políticas Educativas is the property of Educational Policy Analysis Archives & Education Review and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Abstract: This paper presents a case study of two California school districts, San Francisco and Oakland, each of which have implemented their own versions of what is popularly known as a weighted student formula (WSF). One primary goal of the WSF policy is to increase the equity with which resources are distributed to schools. With respect to equity, the findings suggest that for particular schooling levels per-pupil spending became more responsive to student poverty and that the increase in responsiveness appears to have coincided with implementation of the WSF in the two districts. Moreover, each district relies on a different mechanism for driving resources to the schools: San Francisco relying to a greater degree on the unrestricted funds, while Oakland relies more heavily on restricted sources which, as directed by law, drive dollars to special need populations. Interestingly, neither district exhibited any significant change in the distribution of teacher experience after implementation of their SBF models; schools serving the highest proportion of students from low-income families continued to employ teachers with the least experience after implementation of the SBF models. While an additional goal of WSF was to drive more resources down to the school level to be spent, our analysis found little substantial change in the proportion of resources expended at the school versus the district level. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This presentation analyzes the history and current status of equity issues that California's classroom teachers and school administrators; university professors in teacher education; and national, state and local government policymakers have encountered regarding the education of students from linguistically and culturally diverse backgrounds. The number of linguistically and culturally diverse K-12 grade students in California, mainly Latino but also including Asian, has doubled in the past generation, while the proportion of Euro-American/White native English speaking students has decreased substantially. To understand California's experience with linguistically and culturally diverse students, it is important to differentiate between the educational implications of students' (a) ethnicity/race and their (b) home language. Lack of resources for addressing diversity has resulted in extraordinary educational challenges for those students and their parents, as well as for teachers, teacher trainers, school administrators, educational policymakers, and advocates for educational equity and social cohesion. Characteristics and consequences of social class are intertwined with those of ethnicity/race. Furthermore, these learner-and system variables interact to directly and heavily impact educational equity. Inadequate resources and poor educational outcomes for some result from the convergence of these complex issues. This presentation provides examples of these issues, and a framework for examining them. To provide that framework, this presentation (1) analyzes the characteristics and outcomes of the four major types of English language and academic development programs that California schools have created for linguistically and culturally diverse students, and (2) explores the implication of California's experience for European and other contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines the racial and ethnic distribution of the costs and benefits of higher education in California. This exploratory work documents the racial and ethnic distribution of these benefits, in the form of enrollments in different sectors and different types of institutions, as well as on the costs, in the form of the share borne by families versus the state. The study builds on the work of Hansen and Weisbrod, who examined the distribution of costs and benefits for higher education in California for students from different income groups. This study utilizes data from a variety of sources, including the California Post- secondary Education Commission, the California Student Aid Commission, EdFund of California, the National Center for Education Statistics, the U. S. Census Bureau, and other agencies and departments in California. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]