One year ago, State Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O’Connell anticipated having $18 billion more to spend on students in the state than his department has today.

That dollar amount was hoped for before the state found itself in its current financial quagmire. The loss of revenue has prevented class-size reduction, diminishing the achievement gap and funding more career technical programs, O’Connell said at a town hall meeting last night hosted by state Assemblyman Jerry Hill, D-San Mateo.

“The budget is ugly. No matter how bad I say it is — it’s worse,” O’Connell said.

While the state suffers with its woeful budget, state Sen. Joe Simitian, D-Palo Alto, may have a solution for local school districts to fund its schools, O’Connell said.

Simitian is proposing a constitutional amendment, SCA 6, that would allow local school districts to approve a local parcel tax with a 55 percent majority rather than the two-thirds majority currently required. If approved, local school districts could gain more money and have greater control over the programs it wants to fund.

Preschool will also be key to closing the achievement gap, O’Connell said.

“Students are behind even entering kindergarten,” O’Connell said. “Preschool may be the state’s best investment.”

A full 20 percent of students did not graduate from high school last year, O’Connell said. That number might seem high but it is down from 21 percent two years ago.

California is 30 percent behind the rest of the country in funding education and that was before the state had to slash an additional 20 percent from its budget earlier this year, Hill said.

And despite San Mateo County scoring well above the rest of the state in standardized tests, a quarter of the schools in the county are in program improvement, said Jean Holbrook, San Mateo County superintendent of schools.

With San Mateo County increasingly becoming more diverse, Holbrook champions closing the achievement gap between students who speak different languages or who come from lower socio-economic backgrounds.

“Closing the achievement gap should be a priority. There are great disparities between students. It shouldn’t matter what zip code a student comes from or how much money their parents make or what ethnicity they are. It is a moral imperative to close the achievement gap,” said Holbrook, who joined O’Connell in answering questions from a crowd of about 200 people at Hillsdale High School last night.

Career Technical Education may also be a way to keep students in school along with private partnerships, O’Connell said. Pacific Gas and Electric is currently funding a program called the Career Partnership Academy that has a 96 percent graduation rate with 70 percent of the students being college ready, O’Connell said. At least half of the academy’s 250 students are identified as at-risk, or from low socio-economic backgrounds or limited language skills.

And although O’Connell did not have the kindest words for the federal government’s No Child Left Behind program, he did say it puts more focus on subgroups.

“No Child Left Behind sets us up for failure,” O’Connell said.

Art classes, librarians, counselors and nurses have been cut across the state and class sizes have increased, up to 46 per teacher in some high school math class, O’Connell said.

The state’s high dropout rate costs the state billions in dollars in productivity each year and individualized strategies are necessary for each unique student, O’Connell said. But those individualized strategies can not be accomplished with a 750-1 student-to-counselor ratio, he said.

Schools have had to cut extracurricular activities that may lead to high dropout rates, Holbrook said.

“We need to reinvigorate the arts. Some students won’t be engaged without extra-curricular activities.”

O’Connell also said the state needs to do a better job of hiring culturally competent teachers. White women comprise 72 percent of all public school teachers in the state, O’Connell said, leaving a lack of adequate role models for many students.

There is good news on the education front, however. More students are passing the state Exit Exam at first take than in years past and standardized test scores are up in every grade at every subject level, O’Connell said.

Bill Silverfarb can be reached by e-mail: silverfarb@smdailyjournal.com or by phone: (650) 344-5200 ext. 106.