This episode we’re bringing attention to an important but still under-examined subject: the need for schools and school systems to better attend to the intersection of language and disability for young multilingual learners.

Focusing on multilingualism and disability offers insight into a larger and more persistent question we’ve dug into throughout this series—that is, how can district leaders, including superintendents and school business officials, make decisions and take actions that more effectively identify and meet the needs of all their students?

Host Jason Willis is joined by two WestEd colleagues, Jamey Burho and Elizabeth Burr. Both have worked extensively on policies and practices that support the needs of multilingual learners, particularly those with disabilities. In the past couple of years, Jamey and Elizabeth have co-authored key studies, including a 2022 report, “Resourcing Supports for Young Multilingual Learners with Suspected Disabilities in California,” and in Dec. 2023, "Pre-Referral Processes in California State Preschool Programs: How Practitioners Decide to Refer Multilingual Children for Special Education Evaluation" along with Alyssa Perez.

More About Our Guests

As a Senior Research Associate on the Research-Practice Partnerships team at WestEd, Elizabeth Burr coordinates research projects, including policy analyses, literature reviews, and syntheses with the Regional Educational Laboratory West. She authored Guidance Manuals for Educators of English Learners with Disabilities: Ideas and Lessons from the Field, and was a lead author of California Practitioners’ Guide for Educating English Learners with Disabilities. Currently she is working on a comprehensive toolkit for educators of English learners with disabilities. Prior to joining WestEd in 2007, Elizabeth was a Project Director at the John W. Gardner Center for Youth and Their Communities at Stanford University, and a Project Director at Policy Analysis for California Education.

Jamey Burho is a Senior Research Associate with the English Learners Services and Migrant Education (ELMES) team and the Special Education Policy & Practice (SEPP) team at WestEd. Her expertise focuses on students identified as English Learners with disabilities, or dually identified students. As part of WestEd’s Quality Teaching for English Learners (QTEL) program, Jamey routinely leads professional development sessions across the country for educators on how to support multilingual students. Prior to joining WestEd, Burho was a postdoctoral fellow at Oregon State University. She began her education career in Washington, D.C. as a special education teacher. She holds a BS in international relations from Georgetown University, an MA in teaching (special education) from Trinity Washington University, and a Ph.D. in special education from University of Maryland.

Jason Willis serves as Director of Strategic Resource Planning and Implementation for WestEd, and he is a former chief business official in several California school districts.

Budgeting for Educational Equity is presented by CASBO and WestEd. The series is written and produced by Paul Richman and Jason Willis. Original music and sound by Tommy Dunbar. Alyssa Perez and Hannah Jarmolowski at WestEd provides research and develop the written briefs that go along with episodes.

The Equity Multiplier -- a new $300 million component to California’s Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) -- is rolling out this school year.

Guests Natalie Wheatfall-Lum and Sara Pietrowski join Jason Willis to describe how the Equity Multiplier works, how it came about, and related changes to the state’s accountability system, including what districts must now report in their Local Control and Accountability Plans (LCAPs).

Along the way, they consider broader policy issues and implications for targeting LCFF funds directly to the school sites whose student populations generate them; helping LEAs better identify and address the needs of all of their students; and the importance of focusing on Black student achievement in particular.

The Equity Multiplier is one piece of a larger set of changes to California’s accountability system that were enacted as part of the 2023-24 state budget. Eligibility for the additional funding is based on two indicators at school sites: prior year non-stability rates of greater than 25 percent and prior year socioeconomically disadvantaged pupil rates greater than 70 percent. Similar to LCFF, the funds flow from the state to school districts or other local education agencies; however, in a shift from LCFF, Equity Multiplier funds are required to be used at the school sites that generate them.

About Our Guests

Natalie Wheatfall-Lum, J.D., serves as Director of TK-12 Policy at The Education Trust-West, where since 2014 she has supported the organization’s policy research, analysis, and position development, primarily in K-12 equitable funding and accountability. Before working in education policy, Natalie practiced law, gaining experience in various civil rights issues, including LGBTQ equal rights, fair housing, and immigration.

Sara Pietrowski serves as Policy Director for the California State Board of Education, where she has supported the board’s work of developing an accountability and continuous improvement system for more than six years, including the LCAP, California School Dashboard, and Statewide System of Support. She previously served in Sacramento City USD where she led development of the district’s data dashboard and coordinated LCAP and improvement science efforts.

About Our Host

Jason Willis serves as Director of Strategic Resource Planning and Implementation for WestEd, and he is a former chief business official in several California school districts.

Related Resourcess

• Equity Multiplier page, CDE website and 2023-24 First Principal Apportionment of EM funds
• Supporting the African-American Learner: Guide for Transforming Beliefs, Systems and Practices for Black Students
• Evaluation of California’s Differentiated Assistance, WestEd
• More To Be Done: California’s LCFF After A Decade, Education Trust-West

Budgeting for Educational Equity is presented by CASBO and WestEd. The series is written and produced by Paul Richman and Jason Willis. Original music and sound by Tommy Dunbar. Alyssa Perez and Hannah Jarmolowski at WestEd provides research and develop the written briefs that go along with each episode.

Closing or consolidating neighborhood schools is a painful decision that no school district or community ever wishes to face, but increasingly it may be on the table due to declining enrollment trends and budgetary pressures.

In this episode, host Jason Willis and school finance and policy veteran Carrie Hahnel deepen our understanding about school closures and consolidations. They delve into current factors that could lead to more closures and data showing how closures have disproportionately impacted different student populations. They pinpoint the tension schools and communities must try to resolve between difficult and necessary budget decisions on one hand and the enormous potential equity effects of those decisions on the other.

Carrie serves as a senior associate partner for policy and evaluation at Bellwether and a senior policy and research fellow with Policy Analysis for California Education (PACE). She and colleagues Max Marchitello and Dr. Francis Pearman co-authored a series of recent research for PACE related to declining enrollment, equity, and closures.

Jason and Carrie further explore how district and school leaders can proactively approach considerations about school closures while centering equity, and:

• The extent to which closures or consolidations achieved expected savings for districts,
• Connections between demographic trends, housing, segregation and other local issues to resource disparities,
• How the State of California has started to weigh in on the issue of school closures, and
• The importance for districts of pairing a school closure process with an affirmative strategy to provide students that will be displaced with high quality educational opportunities.

“It’s hard not to be paying attention to school closures if you’re paying attention to what’s happening in schools."

About Our Guest

Carrie Hahnel currently serves as a senior associate partner on the policy team at Bellwether, a national nonprofit. Previously, she focused on equitable school funding as an advocate at the Education Trust West, and as a policy director at the Opportunity Institute. She has worked extensively with the statewide research organization PACE. Her research has focused on school funding formulas, equity, tax policies and local budgeting practices and decisions, among other areas.

About Our Host

Jason Willis serves as Director of Strategic Resource Planning and Implementation for WestEd, and he is a former chief business official in several California school districts.

Key Resources

• Centering Equity in the School Closure Process in California – Report
• Declining Enrollment, School Closures, and Equity Considerations – Policy brief and related PACE Webinar.
• Examining Racial (In)equity in School-Closure Patterns in California – Working Paper

Budgeting for Educational Equity is presented by CASBO and WestEd. The series is written and produced by Paul Richman and Jason Willis. Original music and sound by Tommy Dunbar. Alyssa Perez and Hannah Jarmolowski at WestEd provides research and develops the written briefs that go along with each episode.