California spends more cash on schools with neediest kids. How that’s going after 10 years

A DECADE AFTER California revolutionized the way it funds schools, nearly everyone agrees the initiative has done what it was meant to do: improved math and reading scores and brought more resources to students who struggle the most.

And nearly everyone also agrees that the Local Control Funding Formula, as it’s known, could use a tune-up. Black and Latino students’ test scores have improved but still lag behind their white and Asian peers, and schools in affluent areas still spend far more per student than schools in poorer neighborhoods.