A Success Story at an Orange County Charter

By California Policy Center
05/15/2023
By Michael Davis Dire were the predictions when our little charter school, Orange County Classical Academy, was approved over three years ago in a famously raucous Orange Unified School District board hearing.  The skepticism was forgivable then but not today. In its first year of operation, 50 percent of OCCA’s English Learners achieved English-language proficiency by the...

TAGS: California Charter School Association, california public schools, Charter schools, orange county, Orange County Board of Education, orange county classical academy, public schools

California Policy Center’s Statewide Take Back California Education Tour Continues 

By Lance Christensen
03/28/2023
It did not take long after I announced a statewide education reform tour as a former candidate for Superintendent of Public Instruction and in my role as California Policy Center’s Vice President of Education Policy and Government Affairs to receive an overwhelming and positive response. Parents, educators, school board members, and other concerned community members...

TAGS: California public education, education, education reform, Lance Christensen, orange county, Sacramento

The Orange County Classical Academy is Going to Transform Education in California

By Edward Ring
07/08/2020
***Watch a mini-documentary on the creation of OCCA HERE*** In barely one month, 360 elementary school students will begin attending a new charter school that offers a dramatic departure from the failed public education model in California. The Orange County Classical Academy (OCCA) will open its doors to kindergarten through 5th-grade students, and apart from the...

TAGS: Charter schools, Common Core, orange county, orange county classical academy, school choice, teachers unions

Firefighting in Orange County – Part One, Firefighter Pay and Benefits

By Edward Ring
06/17/2020
In June 2019 the City of Placentia, in a 3-1 council vote, decided to leave the Orange County Fire Authority and build their own fire department. The reasons for this decision, and the means to accomplish it, will be explored in greater detail in a follow-up article. But the decision came down to this: a majority...

TAGS: firefighters, orange county, Orange County Fire Authority, pensions, placentia, Unions

Low-profile legal fight has big implications for education

By Greg Rolen
02/26/2020
A little-known lawsuit in Orange County has important implications for each of California’s 58 county departments of education, and chances are you’ve heard nothing about it. On November 18, 2019, the Orange County Board of Education sued the Orange County Superintendent of Schools, Al Mijares, because Mijares refused to recognize that the board had any...

TAGS: Al Mijares, orange county

Politicians who accept Government Union money betray the public

By Edward Ring
09/12/2019
Public sector unions should be illegal. They have very little in common with private sector unions, which, properly regulated, play a vital role in society. The differences between public sector and private sector unions are significant. For example: 1 – Private sector unions cannot be unreasonable in the demands they bring to negotiations with management,...

TAGS: California, Charter schools, conservative, Costa Mesa, firefighters, orange county, public sector unions, school choice

How “Release Time” causes Taxpayers to fund Government Unions

By Edward Ring
07/17/2019
Based on an estimated total membership of 1.1 million and average dues per member of around $700, California’s public sector unions collect and spend approximately $800 million per year. The impact of the June 2018 decision by the U.S. Supreme Court in the case Janus vs AFSCME may have chopped around $50 million off that annual total, by eliminating the union’s...

TAGS: government unions, irvine, Janus, K-12, orange county, release time, Unions

Red Flags for California Actuarial Advisory Panel

By Edmund Pine
04/03/2017
Last month, CalPERS removed from its website the controversial “Myths vs. Facts” page, ending one of the agency’s efforts to soothe public anxiety about the cost of rising pension benefits to public employees. Some sources close to CalPERS told California Policy Center that the page was so riddled with errors that there were demands for...

TAGS: OCERS, orange county

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California’s Literacy Crisis

For decades, teachers, parents, academics, scientists, and curriculum developers have been engaged in a pitched battle over the best methods to implement effective, comprehensive and practical reading instruction. This controversy, dubbed the “reading wars,” has had lifelong consequences for a generation of students who have been hostages and unwitting casualties of the war. Experts believe...

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