Copyright© 2007 by School Services of California, Inc.

                                      Volume 20                   For Publication Date: April 13, 2007             No. 8

Are Community Colleges Receiving Their
Fair Share of Lottery Funds? 

Community Colleges receive one out of every seven dollars of Lottery proceeds, or 14.2%, according to a recent report by the California Budget Project (CBP). K-12 education receives eight of every ten dollars, or 80.8%. The report also explained the declining significance of Lottery funds (1.9% of K-12 funding comes from the Lottery) and contradictions between the intent of the enacting proposition and how the money is spent (see http://www.cbp.org/pdfs/2007/0703_sff_Lottery.pdf). 

Fair Share: What Percentage of Lottery Funds Should Community Colleges Receive? 

Among the statistics in the report, the information about the community college share of Lottery funds proved to be of interest. While it is true that K-12 education serves more students and is organized into far more districts than community college education, many of these students navigate a joint K-12/community college pipeline to success at the California State University (CSU), University of California (UC), and in the workforce. In fact, the 2007 California Community College Accountability Report concluded that 45.3% of graduates from the UC and CSU transferred from a community college. With 66 of every 1,000 Californians attending a community college (2005-06), and the reality of a changing workforce faced with the dual tensions of career-technical training and lifelong learning, are community colleges receiving their fair share of California State Lottery funds?

—Angelo Williams