Did California Quietly End “Butts In Seats” School Funding? What This Means For Parents And Teachers
The fluorescent lights in my 4th grade classroom hummed low after school last month, and a half-eaten bag of goldfish crackers sat between me and Mia’s mom at the conference table. She flipped through the work samples I’d laid out, then paused, leaning forward. “What happened to the after-school reading program? Last year there were two aides helping the kids who needed extra practice, this year it’s just you. District said they got a bigger budget this year, right?”
I sighed, leaning back in my chair. That’s the question I’ve gotten at least a dozen times this semester, and most people don’t want to hear the answer: it all goes back to how California pays for public schools, and a quiet change most parents have never even heard of.
For as long as I’ve taught in this small suburban district outside Sacramento, funding was tied to average daily attendance—what every teacher in the lounge just called “butts in seats.” Every kid that missed a day meant a cut to our school’s budget, plain and simple. I’ve worked at this school for 12 years, and I’ve seen us lose $14,000 in one week during the 2019 flu outbreak, when 18 kids stayed home sick. That year, we had to cut our 4th grade field trip to the state science museum, the one the kids look forward to all year.
The pressure trickled down to parents, too. I’ll never forget the mom who brought her 8-year-old in to class with strep throat, fever glowing off his skin, and apologized to me in the hallway saying, “We already had three absences this semester, I couldn’t risk hurting the class’s budget.” That’s how the old system worked: it rewarded pushing kids to come to school no matter what, even when they were too sick to learn, even when they were exposing everyone else.
When COVID hit, the state panicked. With hundreds of thousands of kids out sick or learning from home, cutting every district’s budget to match attendance would have gutted public education. They paused the “butts in seats” model temporarily, switching to funding based on a single enrollment count taken every October. Then, in 2022, they made the change permanent—barely any news coverage, no big announcements, just a line item in the state budget that most parents still don’t know exists. So yeah, California did quietly quit “butts in seats” funding. The question is, what does that actually mean for you?
The good stuff first, because there’s a lot of good. I don’t have to send three robocalls to a parent whose kid has asthma and needs an extra day off after a flare-up. We got rid of the perfect attendance pizza parties that left kids with chronic conditions sitting in the classroom during lunch feeling left out, for no reason. Last month, a parent texted me asking if it was okay if her kid stayed home to reset after a big fight with her best friend, and I got to text back “Absolutely, take the day, no problem” instead of adding a caveat about funding. That’s a huge shift in the daily stress families feel, and most people don’t even notice it because it’s such a quiet change.
But there’s a big catch, the one that’s sitting right in front of me and Mia’s mom every day. Funding is locked in based on how many kids are enrolled on that October count day. Any kid that enrolls after that—whether their family moved for work, escaped an unsafe housing situation, or switched districts mid-year for any reason—doesn’t bring any extra funding with them. Our school has a lot of mobile families; about 10% of our student body moves in after the October count every year. This year, we got 11 new kids after count day, that’s almost a whole extra class of kids, and we got zero extra money to cover aides, supplies, or extra support. That’s why we had to cut the part-time literacy aide position that ran the after-school reading program.
Mia’s mom nodded, twisting her coffee cup between her hands. She’d had no idea. Most people don’t. After she left, I jotted down a few notes I’ve been collecting for parents and other teachers, small concrete things that make this new system work a little better.
For parents, the first tip I give is to enroll your kid as soon as you move into a new district, even if you don’t have all the paperwork yet. Most districts will accept conditional enrollment with a lease agreement or a utility bill that’s still in your old landlord’s name, and getting that enrollment done before the October count means your kid brings funding with them to the school. If you enroll mid-year, even after the count, getting that paperwork processed right away helps your district apply for extra state money for over-enrolled classes. Second, don’t stress about the occasional absence. Those automated attendance reminder texts are just an old procedure that hasn’t been updated; schools don’t lose money per day your kid stays home anymore. If your kid is sick or needs a day off, keep them home, no guilt attached.
For teachers, I share the link to California’s interim attendance grant in our district teacher chat every September. Most teachers don’t know it exists, but you can get up to $500 per new student that enrolls after count day if your school has more than 5% new students post-count. It’s not enough to cover a full aide, but it can cover extra supplies or a few hours of after-school help every week, which is better than nothing.
It’s not a perfect system. We still have gaps, especially for kids from low-income mobile families that get stuck in underfunded classes mid-year. No one’s fixed the underlying problem of California still underfunding public education overall, this just changed where the gaps fall. But last week, when a dad texted me apologizing for keeping his 2nd grader home with a fever, I got to text back “No rush, we’ll see you when he’s feeling better” and that’s something we never could have done five years ago. We’re still figuring it out, one enrollment and one grant application at a time. The change was quiet, but it’s changed the small daily stuff that matters for parents and teachers, for better and for worse.
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