Perspectives of Key Central Office Staff and School Principals Regarding Resource Allocation Policies and Procedures. A Report Prepared for Los Angeles Unified School District. SSFR Research Report #02 (LAUSD)

This report summarizes the perspectives and attitudes of a selected set of district and school site administrators whom the authors interviewed in Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) during the fall and winter of the 2009-2010 school year. The authors carried out interviews with selected district administrators and a series of focus groups with school principals to gain an understanding of how the current budgeting system operates, and to obtain some information on the attitudes and perspectives of various administrative staff on the strengths and challenges of the current budgeting system and how this system measures up against some of the policy goals of SSFR, such as equity, transparency, accountability, innovation, and efficiency. With assistance from several graduate students from the UCLA Anderson Graduate School of Management, the authors completed a series of principal interviews in seven of the eight sub-districts within LAUSD (with one district electing not to participate). Some themes that emerged from the principal interviews and focus groups include the following: (1) School leaders believe they need greater control over their budgets and how the resources are allocated. They also believe that their budgets should remain stable so that they can continue to provide programs effectively. School leaders believe that the schools and students would benefit from greater control; (2) School leaders do not feel that they currently have the capacity (human resources or technology) to handle potential increased budget control; (3) Many school leaders do not feel that they are adequately supported by the central office. They do not feel that they receive the support they need to manage their budget; (4) Not all school leaders fully understand current budgeting system nor the benefits of moving to a more transparent budgeting processes; and (5) Principals feel that they spend a lot of time planning the budget and meeting budgetary requirements rather than implementing programs outlined in the budget. (Contains 3 footnotes.) [This paper was written with the assistance of Alejandro Tinajero, Adam Mendler, Gary Marshall, Will Snyder, Saurabh Mathur, and Rachel Stark.]