Yes your child is a snowflake, but so is everyone else.

How would you feel if your friend had a child in a different school district then the one your child attends and you discovered that the district of your friend invested 6x the amount of resources into the education of their students?

Let's put this into today's dollars. Right now California funds schools at an amount of around $10,000 per student per year. In the scenario above that would mean that your friend's district is funding their schools at $60,000 per student. Do you think the extra $50,000 will make a difference in the quality of education? Of course, more money means more resources, higher salaries for teachers, which means the ability to recruit top-notch talent.

Prior to 1972 the way schools were funded had this discrepancy, and California passed laws to equalize funding, but this step was only going part of the way to close the funding gap.

Do you know that all students are not created equal? If a student has a learning disability, or their first language is not English, does that student have the right to the same quality of education as a student with no learning or language challenges?

In my view and according to state and federal law the answer is yes. If that is the case, then some students require more support then others. More support means more resources. More resource means more money.

When the states equalized funding it closed the gap between wealthy districts and poor districts, but there was another gap that remained unaddressed. Over 40 years later, in 2013, Governor Brown passed the Local Contol Funding Formula, which provided a weighted student funding formula. It acknowledged that the equalization of funding was not equitable. By weighing student populations, those students who need the most support get the most funding, thus bringing greater equity to how the state funds public schools. With the Local Control and Accountability Plan, districts are held accountable for how they use the additional funds they receive to improve the performance of the students for whom the funding is intended.

The system is far from perfect but it is a move in the right direction. California still ranks in the lower 50 percentile in per-pupil funding, but the trend over the past few years is positive.

So yes, your child is a snowflake, but there are some snowflakes that need some extra help to get to the ground to make their contribution to the world.