Education Lingo: A Glossary of Terms
The public education world contains a plethora of unending acronyms. This document is meant to serve as a living list of key terms mentioned throughout this website.
- ADA (Average Daily Attendance): The average number of students who attend school each day during the school year. This figure is used to calculate state funding, as most education funding in California is allocated on a per-ADA basis.
- COLA (Cost of Living Adjustment)
- Statutory COLA: An annual percentage increase applied to base education funding rates to reflect inflation. The COLA rate is determined by a statutory formula tied to inflation indexes. While it reflects cost increases, it does not guarantee that all districts will receive the full percentage increase due to enrollment or attendance changes.
- Effective/Funded COLA: The actual increase in a district’s funding that results from applying the Statutory COLA to its specific student enrollment and attendance figures. This often differs from the Statutory COLA and often falls short of the Statutory COLA, particularly in districts with declining enrollment.
- LCFF (Local Control Funding Formula): California’s primary K–12 funding model. LCFF provides a base grant per student per day of attendance, plus additional funds through Supplemental and Concentration Grants for districts with high numbers of students who are low-income, English learners, or in foster care. LCFF is intended to give districts more local control over how education dollars are spent.
- January Budget Proposal: The Governor’s initial budget plan released each January, outlining proposed state spending, including education funding assumptions and COLA estimates, for the upcoming fiscal year.
- May Revise: A revised version of the Governor’s budget proposal released in May, incorporating updated revenue projections, enrollment trends, and other economic indicators. It provides the final proposal from the Governor before the state budget is adopted in June by the Legislature.
- Per ADA / Per ADA Funding: The amount of funding a district receives divided by the total number of students attending daily on average (ADA). This provides a normalized comparison of how much funding is received per student across districts.
- Proposition 98: A constitutional amendment passed in 1988 that guarantees a minimum level of funding for California’s K–14 public education system. Prop 98 ensures that education receives a consistent share of the state budget, even during downturns. Underfunding Prop 98 may be considered a violation of state constitutional requirements.
- UPP (Unduplicated Pupil Percentage): The proportion of students who are low income, English learners, or foster youth. “Unduplicated” means each student is only counted once, even if they fall into multiple categories. A higher UPP increases the amount of LCFF funding a district receives through Supplemental and Concentration Grants.
- UPC (Unduplicated Pupil Count): The raw number of students who are classified as low-income, English learners, or foster youth — the actual headcount used to calculate the UPP.