The Eastin Investment Plan

By Delaine Eastin

State Superintendent Delaine Eastin has been leading efforts to raise school funding up to the national average. The Eastin Investment Plan outlines some of her top priorities for school funding.

• Class size reduction. We need to continue to reduce class sizes in California's public schools, especially in our elementary schools.

• Textbooks and library books. We need to increase the stock of textbooks statewide to ensure every child has access to a textbook he or she can take home. Likewise, we need to move the volume of California's school library books from dead last up to the national average.

• More technology. We need to increase our investment in technology to bring California schools into the 21st century. Tennessee wired every classroom in 1996. Delaine wants classrooms in California wired by 2000.

• Longer school year. A longer school year is needed to give students more class time to achieve higher standards. We need a minimum of eight more days of school per year to help children meet higher academic expectations.

• Mandatory summer school and after school programs. When we end social promotion, we will need to institute mandatory summer school, after school and Saturday school to help students reach grade-level standards.

• Restore school purchasing power. Schools need to recoup the purchasing power of teacher salaries, school maintenance and classroom supplies ravaged by the recession of the early 1990s.

• Science. We need to equip our schools with living laboratories in the form of gardens and indoor science facilities in middle schools and high schools.

• Arts. We need to integrate the visual and performing arts into the curriculum of Kindergarten through 12th grade. This is important not only to promote literacy, but also to meet the requirements of the new economy.