With nearly 5.8 million students from kindergarten through grade 12, California's public education system has just undergone a structural change that very few voters — including Vietnamese American voters with children in public schools — have noticed happening right in the middle of election season. Governor Gavin Newsom has signed a bill that strips away the powers of the Superintendent of Public Instruction — the only remaining elected position that directly controls the state Department of Education. Going forward, the winner of this position will only serve as a "public advocate," while day-to-day budget management, personnel, and programs of the Department will be handled by an education commissioner appointed by the governor, set to take effect starting in January.
Voters are still casting ballots for a position whose real power has already been transferred elsewhere.
The Mechanism: Where Power Goes, Who Still Gets Elected
What stands out is that this measure did not go through the normal legislative process but was inserted into the budget bill and passed quickly in the state's appropriation approval process — a lawmaking approach that leaves public scrutiny with almost no opportunity to occur. Because the Superintendent of Public Instruction position is defined in the California Constitution, it cannot be eliminated entirely without a constitutional amendment through voter initiative — so nominally the office still exists, only stripped of its actual authority. Supporters, including Lupita Cortez Alcalá of the PACE organization, argue that separating policy from operational management will strengthen the education governance system. Conversely, the California Teachers Association criticizes it as an act that weakens the democratic process of an office that voters once directly elected.
Why Vietnamese American Families Should Pay Attention to the Expanded Kindergarten Program
The critical point for Vietnamese American families — a group with relatively high early enrollment rates in areas like Orange County — is that California has poured billions of dollars into the transitional kindergarten program for 4-year-olds without any clear plan to evaluate its effectiveness. The new law tasking the new education commissioner with reporting back to the state legislature by October 2027 with specific proposals, including ensuring independent evaluation of such large-scale spending programs. The original bill draft also contained an automatic "fiscal trigger threshold" that would mandate independent evaluation for any program costing 500 million USD annually or more — but this provision was removed from the final version, leaving oversight of education spending dependent more on political will than hard rules.
The November Race and What Remains of the Ballot
This change occurs right as voters are still casting ballots for the person who will sit in a seat that has just been stripped of power. In the primary election, Republican candidate Sonja Shaw leads with 1,737,377 votes (22.6%), while Richard Barrera came in second with 1,557,939 votes (20.3%) — the two will face off in the November election. Earlier, when Governor Newsom first proposed cutting the powers of this office, he had also considered withholding 3.9 billion USD in state education budget as leverage — prompting current Superintendent Tony Thurmond, who is running for governor, to say he was completely taken aback by the plan.
What to Watch
For parents with children in the public school system, three milestone dates matter: the October 2027 reporting deadline on the effectiveness of programs like transitional kindergarten, the November election results between Shaw and Barrera — who will step into a seat that is more symbolic than powerful — and whoever the next governor appoints as the new education commissioner, the person who will actually hold the budget and personnel authority of the California Department of Education from next year onward.