Public records

    What every California public school has to publish

    Charter schools are public schools, so their results, budgets and board decisions are public documents. This page explains which reports exist, what each one actually tells a family, and where the current version lives. The documents themselves are published by each school and by the state — this site does not host or mirror them.

    School Accountability Report Card (SARC)

    Published for every school by February 1 each year. It carries test results, class sizes, teacher credentials, suspension and expulsion rates, facility condition and the school’s own summary of its programs. It is the single most useful document when comparing two schools.

    CDE: SARC overview and search · www.cde.ca.gov/ta/ac/sa

    Local Control and Accountability Plan (LCAP)

    A three-year plan showing the school’s goals, the money attached to them and the results it promises for high-need students. The annual update explains what was actually spent and what changed.

    CDE: Local Control Funding Formula and LCAP · www.cde.ca.gov/re/lc

    California School Dashboard

    The state’s public performance report: academic progress, chronic absenteeism, suspension rates and graduation data, broken out by student group. Useful for seeing a trend rather than a single year.

    Open the California School Dashboard · www.caschooldashboard.org

    Enrolment, staffing and test data (DataQuest)

    The state database behind the reports: enrolment by grade and student group, staffing, and assessment results for any public school in California, including charters.

    CDE DataQuest · dq.cde.ca.gov/dataquest

    Charter petition, renewal and authorizer

    Every charter school operates under a petition approved by a district, county or state board. The petition and the renewal decisions are public records held by that authorizer, and they set out admission preferences, the lottery and the school’s program.

    CDE: charter schools · www.cde.ca.gov/sp/cs

    Board agendas, minutes and the annual audit

    A charter school board is a public body under the Ralph M. Brown Act: agendas are posted in advance, meetings are open, and minutes are public. Each school also files an independent annual audit with its authorizer and the state.

    CDE: audits and accounting · www.cde.ca.gov/fg/ac

    Uniform Complaint Procedures (UCP)

    The formal route for complaints about discrimination, fees, special education services or the LCAP. Every school must publish its UCP notice and the name of the responsible officer.

    CDE: Uniform Complaint Procedures · www.cde.ca.gov/re/cp/uc

    Safety plan and Title IX notice

    Schools adopt a comprehensive safety plan each year and publish a Title IX notice covering sex discrimination and harassment, including the contact for the school’s Title IX coordinator.

    CDE: school safety · www.cde.ca.gov/ls/ss

    How to find these for one particular school

    1. Start on the school’s own website: California law requires the SARC, the LCAP and the safety and complaint notices to be posted there, usually under a heading such as “Transparency”, “Accountability” or “Public notices”.
    2. If a document is missing or out of date, ask the school office in writing. A public school has to make these records available.
    3. For anything the school does not publish, go to the authorizer — the district or county board that approved the charter. Board packets normally contain the petition, the renewal report and the annual audit.
    4. For comparisons across schools, use the state sources above rather than a school’s own summary: the numbers are defined the same way for everyone.

    Reporting rules change from year to year. Where this page describes a deadline or a document, treat the linked state page as the authority — it is updated when the law is.