California
California English and math test scores rise for first time since the pandemic, but still show pandemic learning loss
For the first time since COVID-19 hit, California students demonstrated slight across-the-board gains in math, English and science according to statewide standardized testing data released Thursday.
The news offers a glimmer of hope for some in the face of concerns about pandemic learning loss. But students’ results continue to trail pre-pandemic scores, and Bay Area schools’ performances varied.
Statewide, the number of students who met or exceeded grade-level standards increased a little less than half a percentage point in English and science, to 47% and 30.7%, and nearly a full percentage point in math, to 35.5%. Socioeconomically disadvantaged students also showed the strongest gains, with about a 1.5 percentage point increase in the number of students who met grade-level standards in English and science, to 36.8% and 20.7%, and more than a 2 percentage point increase in math, to 25% of students.
“Today’s results suggest that California’s public schools are making encouraging gains in all of the key subject areas, and these gains are largest for our most vulnerable groups of students,” said Linda Darling-Hammond, the state board of education president.
But Alix Gallagher, director of strategic partnerships at Policy Analysis for California Education, an independent research center, cautioned against putting too much stock in the small changes reflected in the most recent testing scores.
“Some of these gains are so small, I don’t know that I would call them gains,” she said. “We are still years from catching up to where we were before the pandemic, and we still have under half of our students meeting proficiency standards. So I don’t think there’s a positive way to spin that at this point.”
The data shows that students’ scores in English and math continue to trail pre-pandemic results, and a majority of California students are still placing below grade-level standards in all three subjects.
The results come from the latest Smarter Balanced Assessments in English and math and the California Science Test, which students took in spring 2024. The assessments are computer-based, standardized tests used in several states, including California, to measure students’ understanding of content benchmarks in the three subjects.
Performance among some of the Bay Area’s biggest school districts varied.
Math scores in San Jose Unified increased at a higher rate, a 1.3 percentage point gain, but the district also saw a slight drop in English scores, with a 0.9 percentage point decrease. San Jose Unified students performed slightly better than the state average in all subjects, with about 49.5% of students meeting or exceeding grade-level standards in English, 40.9% in math and 26.4% in science.
San Jose Unified did not immediately respond to the Bay Area News Group’s request for comment.
Oakland Unified saw a slight increase in English and math scores, up 0.03 and 0.15 percentage points respectively, but still performed below state averages, with about 33% of students meeting or exceeding grade-level standards in English, compared to 25.6% in math and 20.2% in science.
The district’s director of communications, John Sasaki, said Oakland Unified is pleased with the increase in test scores but knows there is a lot more work left to do. Sasaki credited the district’s focus on improving literacy and community partnerships as one of the reasons for the slight bump in students’ performance.
“We have a long way to go before we have the test scores where we want them to be. Our students deserve more,” Sasaki said.
Fremont Unified saw across-the-board declines — a 2.2 percentage point decrease in English, 1.1 percentage point decrease in math and 2.7 percentage point decrease in science — but scores still outperformed both San Jose and Oakland Unified as well as the state averages. About 73.6% of students in the district met or exceeded grade-level standards in English, 68.5% in math and about 59% in science.
While the district’s superintendent, Erik Burmeister, said he was “incredibly impressed” by the achievement and resilience of the district’s students and staff, he also pointed out that test score data cannot fully measure students’ overall success.
“The instruction each of our students receives in the classroom and through needs-responsive intervention at each of our schools is outstanding,” Burmeister said. “Our work to meet students’ academic, social and emotional needs will continue, and the full body of their achievement will be celebrated.”
All three districts’ most recent scores continued to lag behind pre-pandemic results in English and math. San Jose Unified’s scores were down 5.6 percentage points in English and 2.7 percentage points in math compared to the district’s scores for the 2018-2019 school year, while Oakland Unified’s scores were down 0.4 percentage points in English and 1.4 percentage points in math, and Fremont Unified’s scores were down more than 5 percentage points in both English and math.
Gallagher pointed out that California lagged behind most states for student performance going into the pandemic and fell further and made less progress than many states after the pandemic.
“Even if some kids did better this year, I’m still really worried,” she said.
She pointed to the “fiscal cliff” and declining enrollment many school districts in the state and Bay Area are facing, as well as a youth mental health crisis, spike in chronic absenteeism and low morale among educators.
“Should we be happy about gains for students who are socioeconomically disadvantaged? Absolutely,” she said. “But I think there are fundamental system challenges that have made it hard for families, for students, for educators to recover from the pandemic.”
Gallagher also said the gains in this year’s scores were during a time when schools had extra funding and support from the pandemic. Federal COVID-relief funding for U.S. schools — which totaled about $190 billion — expired at the end of last month. California schools received about $23.4 billion in funds.
“I think we should recognize the way those funds supported improvement to the extent to which we’ve seen it and be really cautious about what to expect now that many districts are watching those funds just kind of evaporate from under them,” Gallagher said.
Originally Published:
California
Northern California’s House of Clocks has stood the test of time for 55 years
While we may lose an hour of sleep this coming weekend, one clock store in California is gearing up for one of its busiest times of the year: daylight savings.
It’s the House of Clocks, the largest clock company in Northern California, which was recently celebrating 55 years of business.
It’s a place frozen in time. Just visit the store’s 240-year-old grandfather clock. It’s got plenty of stories to tell, dating back to 1780.
“This is the oldest piece we have right now,” clocksmith Joey Hohn said.
The House of Clocks is on the outskirts of Downtown Lodi in San Joaquin County.
“We have new, we have vintage, we have antique,” co-owner Sandy Hohn shared. “Honestly, it feels like not a day goes by that we don’t get a phone call or an email of somebody wanting to sell something for 100 different reasons.”
The clock store has been with the Hohn family for three generations. It’s all thanks to one family heirloom.
“When the first war started, [my grandparents] left everything and had to move,” Joey Hohn explained. “After the Second World War, my grandpa was stationed in Germany. They went back to the house that had been abandoned and the neighbor who they left the property to said, ‘As far as I’m concerned, everything in the house is still yours.’ They went back and got this, so this is my great-great-grandparents’ clock.”
You can find just about anything in the House of Clocks, from old grandfather clocks to clocks that can fit in the palm of your hand.
What you can’t find anywhere else is the Hohns’ love for Lodi.
“We’ve made so many friends over the years out of customers,” Sandy Hohn said. “Friends that are just wonderful, that love collecting, and we keep them repaired for their families, which is awesome. They have sentimental value that’s passed down.”
That same love for the city and their community runs in the family.
“We had a customer that wanted to repaint their dial,” Joey Hohn explained. “We told them no because it was her father’s who had passed away. Every time he went to wind the clock, he placed his thumb in the same spot. When we told her that smudge there on the dial was her father, she said, ‘Back away, don’t you dare.’ It was just a good memory we have.”
While you can’t turn back time, what we can do is keep memories alive and treasure the present moment.
“There’s so many personalities,” Sandy Hohn said. “We just try to find a good home for them.”
California
Signs of spring blooming at Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve after wet, warm winter
It’s beginning to look a lot like spring!
The warm and wet weather this winter has led to the start of a dazzling super bloom at the Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve.
“We had an unseasonably warm winter as well, so there’s actually a lot of growth,” said Callista Turney with California State Parks. “We’re having early wildflowers that are already at the park. So if you look at the poppy live cam, it shows a lot of orange already.”
The rain has helped the early blooms, but it’s actually the heat that accelerated the growth of the flowers.
“It will actually speed up the growth of the plants, so some of them were already blooming and that’s going to cause those blossoms to accelerate faster towards seed production. And the blossoms that are in the process of being formed, those are going to open up soon as well.”
We also sometimes see great super blooms in Death Valley National Park, Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, Joshua Tree and the Mojave National Preserve.
“It’s definitely a rare occurrence because we don’t always have the right conditions. It’s gotta be the weather, the wind, the rain, all coming together,” said Katie Tilford, Director of Development and Communications with the Theodore Payne Foundation.
If it continues to stay unseasonably warm, we’ll see a shorter bloom. The key to a longer season is milder weather.
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California
Republican governor candidate Chad Bianco says he’s the ‘antithesis to California state government’
We are counting down to the California governor’s race. Chad Bianco, the sheriff of Riverside County, is one of the two biggest names running on the Republican ticket.
In a one-on-one interview with Eyewitness News political reporter Josh Haskell, Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco said, “I am the antithesis to California state government because I am going to take a nuclear bomb into that building and absolutely destroy everything that they do to us behind closed doors.”
Although he’s been elected by the voters twice, Bianco says he’s not a politician — which is why he believes his campaign for California governor is resonating, as reflected in the polls.
“President Trump, in one year, from 2025 when he took over, until now, did absolutely nothing to harm California. What’s harming California is 30 years of Democrat one-party rule that have created an environment here that no one can live in anymore. They’ve only been successful here in California because we vote D no matter what. You vote D or die. I mean, that’s it. Charles Manson would be elected in California if he was the only Democrat on the ballot,” Bianco said.
Bianco isn’t the only conservative Republican running for governor, and according to polling, he’s neck-and-neck with former Fox News host Steve Hilton.
SEE ALSO: CA governor candidate Steve Hilton says ‘everybody supports’ Trump’s immigration policies
Leading in some polls in the wide-open California Governor’s race as the June primary creeps closer is Republican and former Fox News host Steve Hilton.
“Steve has no chance of winning in November. The Democrats know that I’m going to win in November, and so they have to do everything they can to keep me out of that,” Bianco said.
When asked about the affordability crisis in the state, Bianco said, “Almost the entire issue of affordability in California is because of regulation, excessive regulation imposed by government. Every single regulation can be signed away with the governor’s signature.”
“It is a drug and alcohol addiction problem that, and a mental health problem,” he said about the homelessness crisis. “Every single bit of money that is going to these nonprofits that say ‘homeless,’ zero money. You’re getting absolutely nothing. I can’t tell you that we would end what we see in the homeless situation within a year, but I guarantee you we would never see it again after two years.”
When challenged on that prediction, pointing to how the state doesn’t have the facilities to treat the number of people living on our streets, Bianco responded, “We have been conditioned to believe that buildings take five years to build. It takes 90 days or less to build a house, but in California, it takes three to five years because the government won’t allow it. The regulations that are destroying this state are going to be removed with me as the governor.”
Bianco also said California jails shouldn’t have to play the role of treatment facilities.
Although he says he supports the Trump administration and wants the president’s endorsement, Bianco has been traveling the state — meeting not just with Republicans, but Democrats and independents as well. He says all of our state government officials have failed.
The primary election is June 2.
No clear front-runner in race for California governor, new poll shows
A new poll shows there’s still no clear front-runner in the race to replace Gov. Gavin Newsom.
Copyright © 2026 KABC Television, LLC. All rights reserved.
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