New head for assembly education committee
By ALEXANDRA BISSONNETTE Special to the Daily Press
SACRAMENTO From the budget crisis to the rise in immigration, California schools have been slammed with some major hurdles in recent years. On Monday of this week, Assemblymember Julia Brownley (D-Santa Monica) was appointed to serve as the Chair of the Assembly Education Committee to tackle some of those challenges.
“I am thrilled, honored and humbled,” Brownley said. “As a 12-year school board member, I came to the Legislature to try and restore California’s schools back to being the model of educational excellence for the nation. It is simply not acceptable anymore to find this great state near the bottom of every national ranking and measurement for student success. Our educational system has been battered by budget crises and decades of disinvestment. California students deserve better and our future truly depends on their success.”
Taking on California’s education system will not be an easy task. According to Education Week, California ranks 47th in the nation in spending per student, and many argue that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s revised budget — which followed a proposed $4.8 billion cut for K-14 education — is still not enough to ease the pains of a faltering school system and a worsening economy.
Despite the obstacles she faces, Brownley is confident that she can make the changes necessary to reshape the state’s education system.
“I am excited to be in this leadership position where I can craft and monitor legislation that will focus on student achievement, facilitate innovation and improvement, and replicate best practices and excellence across all of our schools,” she said.
Brownley is certainly not lacking in experience. She is currently Chair of the Assembly Budget Subcommittee #2 on Education Finance, and Chair of the Select Committee on Higher Education in the 21st Century.
Her experience with education is in part what prompted Assembly Speaker Karen Bass (D-Los Angeles) to make the appointment.
“Julia’s outstanding background and leadership skills uniquely qualify her to help form good education policy for 21st century California, from pre-K-12 all the way through college," Bass said.
Hopefully, experience and optimism will be enough to counter the challenges facing California schools in the fall.
One issue that continues to be on the minds of education policy makers is the issue of California’s achievement gap — the term used to describe groups of children that continue to trail behind their peers.
With all she faces, Brownley is anxious to get to work.
“I am so grateful to Speaker Bass for giving me this extraordinary opportunity,” Brownley said. “I look forward to working with the Speaker and my colleagues in the Legislature, along with all of the educational advocates at the state and local level, to shape educational policy that will leverage educational excellence for all of California’s children while simultaneously and systematically closing the opportunity and achievement gap that persists in California.”
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on July 10, 2008. Read the original PDF.